62.U84 

H33U5 


Jos.W.  Hays 

Combustion  Cr»|in««r 


'  ( 


804  SYMES  BUILDIf  G,  -  DENVER,  CO! 

Phone  Main  7S39 


How  to  Build  Up  F  urnace 

Efficiency 

A  Hand-book  of  Fuel  Economy 

(Including-  a  few  snorts  about  Industrial  Efficiency  and  other 
things.  Written  for  the  men  who  pay  for  the  fuel 
and  the  men  who  burn  it) 


By 


JOS.  W.  HAYS 

Combustion  Engineer 


Author  of 


“The  Chemistry  of  Combustion,”  “Combustion  and  Smokeless 
Furnaces,”  “Hoav  to  Get  More  Power  From  Coal,” 

“How  to  Stop  the  Fuel  Wastes,”  etc. 


FIFTEENTH  EDITION 

Revised  and  enlarged  (ninety-fifth  thousand) 

Price,  $1.00 

Post-paid  to  any  part  of  the  world 
JOS.  W.  HAYS,  Publisher 

Michigan  City,  Indiana,  U.  S.  A. 

1919 


Copyright  1919  by 
JOS.  W.  HAYS 


All  rights  reserved — 
including  the  rights  of  translation 


Copyright  in  Norway  and  published  in  Danish  and  Norwe¬ 
gian  by  Samuel  Eie,  Slemdal,  Christiana. 


Copyright  in  Great  Britain  and  published  at  Dover,  Eng¬ 
land,  by  the  Dover  Printing  and  Publishing  Co.,  Ltd.,  144 
Snargate  Street. 


Copyright  in  Sweden  and  published  in  Swedish  at  Stock¬ 
holm  by  Samuel  Eie. 


Copyright  in  Brazil  and  published  in  Portuguese  at  Sao 
Paulo  by  Edward  L.  Rolfe. 


5  <s^/.  <f  S'  ?7i 


(p  '/L  I,  /  ^4" 
/V  X  / 


U 

i  mu  0 

HOW  TO  BUILD  UP  FURNACE  EFFICIENCY 

(In  Five  Reels) 


Why  Your  Fuel  is  Wasted .  15 

How  Your  Fuel  is  Wasted .  50 

How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes .  72 

How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes- .  95 

How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped .  126 

APPENDIX 

£ 

Oils,  Gas,  Wood  Refuse  and  Other  Fuels .  164 


PREFACE  TO  THE  FIFTEENTH  EDITION 


In  the  early  part  of  190S  the  author  tendered  a  manuscript 
to  the  editor  of  an  engineering  magazine.  It  was  returned 
with  the  following  comment: 

‘A  our  paper  is  too  technical.  We  get  more  technical  articles 
than  we  can  use.  We  want  practical  articles  written  in  a  pop¬ 
ular  way  and  we  can’t  get  them.  Cut  out  the  “high-brow”  stuff 
ami  let  us  have  something  that  the  great  mass  of  our  readers 
can  peruse  with  interest  and  protit.” 

The  result  of  this  advice  was  the  first  edition  of  “How  to 
Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency,”  published  in  1908.  It  was 
brought  out  with  many  misgivings.  Was  it  really  possible  to 
treat  the  rather  technical  subject  of  combustion  in  a  really 
popular  way — something  that  had  never  been  attempted  by 
anyone  before?  Would  the  public  want  such  a  treatment  even 
if  the  treatment  were  successful?  These  questions  were  not 
long  in  being  answered.  The  first  edition  was  exhausted, 
almost  as  soon  as  the  announcement  of  publication  was  made. 
Succeeding  and  larger  editions  Hollowed  the  first  one. 

The  present  edition,  counting  the  foreign  editions,  is  the 
fifteenth  complete  publication,  and  translations  are  now  being- 
made  for  other  foreign  editions.  Counting  all  publications, 
the  book  has  now  reached  its  ninety-fifth  thousand. 

Many  things  were  omitted  in  the  previous  editions  that 
should  have  been  said  and  some  things  were  said  that  might 
have  been  omitted.  In  the  present  edition,  sufficient  charts, 
diagrams  and  illustrations  are  used  to  make  clear  some  of 
the  things  that  it  is  hard  to  explain  in  the  printed  page. 
Certain  instruments  and  apparatus  designed  by  the  author 
are  illustrated.  In  showing  these  it  is  not  intended  to  dis¬ 
parage  other  apparatus  of  like  character.  The  illustrations 
are  given  for  the  sole  purpose  of  showing  the  “tools”  that 
the  author  has  used  in  prosecuting  combustion  studies  and 
in  working  out  specific  furnace  efficiency  problems  in  many 
plants. 

Cartoons  have  been  used  rather  liberally  in  this  edition 
and  it  is  hoped  that  they  will  serve  to  emphasize  some  of  the 
arguments  that  the  author  has  tried  to  make. 

It  is  in  no  spirit  of  self-flattery  that  the  author  refers 
to  the  past  success  of  his  book.  If  credit  is  due  anyone  it 
belongs  to  the  editor  who  offered  the  advice  above  quoted. 


AN  APPEAL. 


The  author  feels  that  a  real  service  is  being  performed  in 
passing  this  advice  along  to  other  writers.  Let  us  stop  writing 
for  technical  men  who  are  already  well  grounded  in  all  the 
theory  of  engineering.  There  are  relatively  few  of  such  men 
as  compared  with  the  great  multitude  who  want  results  first 
and  who  are  content  to  let  theories  rest  until  results  have  been 
accomplished.  Treat  the  engineering  subject  in  a  really  pop¬ 
ular  way  and  your  book  will  be  read  by  appreciative  thou¬ 
sands.  Treat  it  in  a  really  technical  way  and  it  will  be  read 
by  a  few  hundreds. 

Very  little  is  said  in  this  book  relating  to  the  theory  of 
combustion.  The  author  has  tried  to  write  for  the  men  who 
pay  for  the  fuel  and  the  men  who  burn  it.  They  are  interested 
in  theory,  of  course,  but  they  are  more  interested  in  practical 
and  immediate  results.  They  expect,  in  a  work  of  this  kind, 
advice  and  suggestions  that  will  be  helpful— something  that 
they  can  apply  at  once  in  the  every-day  work  of  operating  an 
every-day  steam  power  plant. 

One  can  easily  determine  .  where  to  begin  when  setting 
about  to  discuss  the  chemistry  of  combustion,  but  it  is  difficult 
to  determine  where  and  when  to  stop.  For  this  reason  and 
the  others  given,  the  author  has  thought  best  .to  make  no 
beginning  at  all.  In  the  present  edition  of  “How  to  Build  Up 
Furnace  Efficiency,”  as  in  the  previous  ones,  the  sole  effort 
has  been  to  show  the  Manager,  Superintendent,  Engineers  and 
Firemen  of  the  power  plant  how  they  may  proceed  at  once  to 
actually  work  a  real  reduction  in  the  coal  bills.  To  this 
practical  end  no  understanding  of  theories  is  necessary.  The 
unlettered  fireman  may  become  an  expert  flue  gas  analyst 
and  reach  the  very  top  notch  of  efficiency  in  the  combustion 
of  fuel  without  knowing  or  caring  what  the  atomic  weight 
of  carbon  may  be  or  why  one  atom  of  carbon  unites  with 
two  of  oxygen  to  form  the  gas  CCK  It  has  been  represented 
and  it  is  generally  understood  that  the  contrary  is  true.  No 
more  mischievous  representation  was  ever  made  with  reference 
to  any  engineering  proposition.  It  is  costing  the  power  plants 
of  the  country  millions  of  dollars.  The  average  steam  plant 
wastes  a  quarter  of  its  fuel.  It  will  go  on  wasting  that  quarter 


6 


Preface. 


until  it  is  recognized  that  the  men  to  stop  the  waste  are  the 
ones  who  are  doing  the  wasting. 

To  burn  coal  or  any  other  fuel  economically  is  mainly 
a  matter  of  method  and  as  the  method  to  be  used  varies  with 
the  character  of  the  fuel  and  the  conditions  under  which  it  is 
to  be  burned,  the  use  of  certain  apparatus  to  determine  the 
proper  method  is  necessary  in  every  power  plant.  It  would 
be,  indeed,  unfortunate  if  the  apparatus  called  for  special  skill 
or  special  knowledge  on  the  part  of  the  user.  Any  man  who 
can  read  a  scale  and  watch  the  flickering  flame  of  a  tallow 
candle  is  qualified  to  bring  any  boiler  furnace  up  to  the  highest 
state  of  efficiency  consistent  with  the  fuel  and  the  furnace 
equipment.  It  will  not  be  disputed  that  your  fireman  is  able 
to  read  a  thermometer  and  tell  you  how  cold  or  how  hot  it  may 
be  in  the  boiler  room,  or  that  he  is  competent  to  use  platform 
scales  and  weigh  your  coal.  It  is  not  considered  that  as  a 
preliminary  to  using  the  thermometer  one  must  understand  the 
involved  mathematics  on  which  the  science  of  thermometry 
depends  or  that,  as  a  preliminary  to  weighing  a  barrow  of  coal, 
one  must  be  able  to  explain  the  laws  of  the  lever  discovered 
by  Archimedes.  You  are  familiar  with  scales  and  thermome-. 
ters  and  you  go  ahead  and  use  them.  You  are  not  familiar 
with  draft  gages  and  gas  analyzers — hence  you  believe  that  a 
diploma  from  a  technical  school  is  necessary  before  you 
can  use  them. 

Every  statement  and  recommendation  made  by  the  author 
has  been  proved  by  actual  experiment  and  practice  to  the 
satisfaction  of  many  people.  Try  the  methods  suggested  before 
you  pass  adverse  judgment  upon  them. 

The  author  feels  called  upon  to  apologize  for  the  frequent 
use  of  the  pronoun  “I”  in  the  pages  that  follow.  The  reader 
must  understand  that  every  line  of  the  book  has  been  written 
l  ight  of  the  writer’s  personal  experiences  and  in  setting  these 
forth  the  pronoun  in  the  first  person  has  obtruded  itself 
repeatedly. 

The  author  does  not  claim  to  be  “the  law  and  the 
prophets”  on  the  subject  treated.  The  reader  must  take  the 
writer’s  opinions  and  experiences  for  what  they  are  worth 
upon  their  face. 


Preface. 


7 


Anecdotes  have  been  liberally  used  throughout  the  book 
for  purposes  of  illustration  and  in  deference  to  these  the 
author  has  followed  a  narrative  style  of  writing  which  it  is 
hoped  may  assist  in  sustaining  the  reader’s  interest  until  he 
has  finished  the  book. 

Combustion  is  a  dry  subject  when  considered  as  an  ab¬ 
stract  proposition.  It  is  not  a  dry  subject  when  “human 
interest”  is  injected  into  it.  It  even  has  its  humorous  phases. 

The  author  believes  that  the  methods  of  “spotting”  and 
stopping  fuel  wastes  described  in  this  book  are  extremely 
simple.  They  may  not  appear  so  to  the  reader.  It  is  difficult 
tc  describe  a  very  simple  operation  to  a  person  who  is  entirely 
unacquainted  with  it  and  in  preparing  the  book  the  author 
has  assumed  that  the  reader  is  not  familiar  with  the  subject 
discussed.  It  is  quite  probable  that  many  persons  reading  the 
book  are  better  grounded  in  both  the  theory  and  the  practice 
of  the  matter  than  the  author.  To  such  as  these  no  apology 
is  offered,  because  the  book  is  not  written  for  them. 

The  author  confesses  to  the  use  of  rather  unvarnished 
language  in  some  places  and  he  knows  that  the  Manager 
and  Engineer  will  accept  his  criticisms  with  the  same  good 
nature  in  which  they  are  offered. 

JOS.  W.  HAYS. 

Michigan  City,  Indiana,  U.  S.  A.,  Sept.  1,  1919. 


This  hook  is  devoted  entirely  to  practice.  If  you 
are  interested  in  both  theory  and  practice,  see 
page  181. 


“Be  sure  to  write  about  me,  honest;  what¬ 
ever  you  do,  do  not  prettify  me;  include  all 
the  hells  and  damns.” 


— Walt  Whitman. 


8 


AN  APPEAL . 


TO  THE  PRESIDENT  AND  CONGRESS: 

This  appeal  is  addressed  to  you  because  another  fuel 
famine  threatens  us.  You  can  avert  that  famine  by  prompt 
and  proper  action  and  you  can  prevent  future  famines  by 
enforcing  the  practice  of  fuel  economy  in  this  country.  And 
when  you  enforce  fuel  economy  you  cut  down  the  high  cost 
of  living,  which,  economists  say,  is  at  the  root  of  the  social 
disturbances  that  threaten  to  engulf  us.  We  believe  that  you, 
Mr.  President  and  Congress,  should  be  held  personally  re¬ 
sponsible  to  our  people  for  any  future  fuel  shortages.  We 
believe  this  because  we  know  that  you  can  prevent  all  fuel 
famines  and  that  you  are  the  only  people  who  can  prevent 
them.  It  is  now  up  to  us  to  show  you  why  this  is  so. 

You  were  quick  to  recognize  that  the  late  world  war  was 
a  war  of  machinery,  that  fuel  was  necessary  to  the  machinery 
of  production  and  of  transportation.  You  created  the  National 
Fuel  Administration  as  an  emergency  war  measure.  Dr.  Gar¬ 
field,  an  able,  honest  and  truly  patriotic  man,  was  placed  at 
the  head  of  the  fuel  administration  and  he  had  the  wisdom 
to  surround  himself  with  some  of  the  best  Combustion 
Engineers  in  the  United  States.  He  was  wise  again  in  his  will¬ 
ingness  to  take  the  advice  of  his  advisory  engineers. 

It  is  not  our  purpose  to  lay  any  wreaths  upon  the  grave 
of  the  now  dead-and-gone  Fuel  Administration.  Rest  its  soul. 
Ic  had  its  troubles.  ‘We  will  let  it  pass  by  saying  that  in  our 
opinion  the  National  Fuel  Administration  in  the  brief  period 
of  its  fretful  existence  did  more  to  arouse  an  interest  in  fuel 
economy  among  the  consumers  of  fuel  than  all  of  the  other 
agencies  combined  that  have  worked  toward  that  end  since  the 
day  when  the  first  savage  struck  a  spark  from  a  flint  and  dis¬ 
covered  fire.  This  is  not  hyperbole.  We  actually  believe  it. 
We,  with  others,  drilled  away  at  the  public  conscience  for 
years,  talking  and  writing  about  fuel  economy,  and  while  we 
may  have  made  some  dents  in  that  adamantine  thing  we  were 
never  able  to  discover  them.  The  National  Fuel  Administra¬ 
tion  in  one  short,  swift  operation  drilled  a  nice,  clean  hole 
clear  through  that  public  conscience.  Every  sinful  fuel 
waster  repented  and  “hit  the  trail”  with  an  enthusiasm  that 
would  have  delighted  the  Rev.  Billy  Sunday.  You  couldn’t  see 


An  Appeal. 


9 


the  mourner’s  bench  for  the  dust  that  was  kicked  up  in  the 
general  stampede. 

How  was  the  national  Fuel  Administration  able  to  bring 
about  such  a  sudden  and  universal  interest  in  fuel  economy? 
You  had  conferred  authority  upon  it  by  a  very  appropriate 
bit  of  emergency  legislation.  It  was  able  to  say,  in  effect, 
“How  much  fuel  are  you  wasting?  You  may  have  the  fuel  that 
you  require  if  you  will  practice  real  fuel  economy  but  you 
shall  not  have  a  single  pound  more.  Stop  wasting  fuel  or  go 
without  fuel.”  The  average  fuel  waster  thinks  about  fuel 
waste  when  he  is  forced  to  think  about  it.  When  he  is  not 
forced  to  do  so  he  thinks  about  other  things.  If  the  work 
started  by  the  National  Fuel  Administration  could  only  be 
continued  there  would  never  be  another  fuel  famine  with  the 
sufferings  that  such  a  famine  entails.  The  price  of  fuel 
would  come  down  and  with  it  the  cost  of  living.  There  is  fuel 
in  almost  everything  that  we  eat,  drink,  wear,  use,  enjoy  and 
do.  There  is  fuel  in  the  message  that  you  receive  over  the 
telephone;  in  the  “near-beer”  that  you  are  now  drinking  while 
you  wish  for  the  real  stuff  that  you  legislated  out  of  existence; 
in  the  imitation  leather  of  your  so-called  shoes;  in  the  grape¬ 
fruit  on  your  breakfast  table,  and  in  the  thousand  other  things 
that  you  think  are  necessary  to  your  daily  lives.  Fuel  is  the 
most  important  commodity  in  all  the  world  at  the  present 
time.  We  wish  that  we  could  make  you  see  that. 

Stop  transportation  and  a  large  proportion  of  our  people 
would  starve.  Shut  down  the  factories  and  we  should  be 
robbed  of  other  necessities  scarcely  less  essential  than  food. 
Stop  the  supply  of  fuel  and  not  a  wheel  would  turn  either  upon 
the  rails  or  in  the  factories.  No  ships  could  leave  our  shores. 
Incidentally  we  should  all  freeze.  Without  fuel  the  war  would 
have  been  lost  and  it  is  therefore  not  too  much  to  say  that 
“Fuel  won  the  war.” 

Nation  of  wasters  that  we  have  been,  there  is  nothing 
that  we  have  wasted  to  the  extent  that  we  have  wasted  fuel. 
The  world’s  supply  of  mineral  fuel  cannot  be  increased  or 
replenished.  Every  pound  that  is  used  or  wasted  represents 
a  draft  upon  an  account  that  cannot  be  replenished  by  more 
deposits.  About  25  per  cent  of  the  fuel  used  in  industrial 


10 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


plants  is  wasted  at  the  furnace.  About  23  per  cent  is  wasted 
between  the  furnace  and  the  machine  in  the  factory  where  the 
energy  is  applied.  These  wastes  are  preventable  and  inexcus¬ 
able.  They  have  nothing  to  do  with  other  losses  that  cannot 
be  avoided  in  the  conversion  of  fuel  into  applied  energy.  This 
48  per  cent  of  the  fuel  that  we  are  mining  and  hauling  to  our 
factories  to  be  wasted  through  ignorance  and  carelessness, 
does  not  belong  to  us.  It  is  the  property  of  posterity  and  you 
are  unworthy  stewards,  MR.  PRESIDENT  and  CONGRESS,  if 
you  neglect  any  means  that  you  may  take  to  conserve  our 
fuel  resources.  FIND  SOME  WAY  TO  PERPETUATE  THE 
WORK  OF  THE  NATIONAL  FUEL  ADMINISTRATION. 

When  we  undertake  to  visualize  the  fuel  that  is  annually 
wasted  in  the  United  States  we  get  a  most  astonishing  picture. 
Forgetting  for  the  moment  that  there  are  other  fuels  than  coal, 
let  us  consider  coal  alone.  We  are  mining  coal  in  the  United 
States  at  the  rate  of  more  than  600,000,000  tons  per  annum. 
As  already  stated,  about  48  per  cent  of  our  fuel  is  needlessly 
wasted.  The  preventable  waste  in  the  boiler  room,  alone,  of 
the  average  steam  plant  is  all  of  25  per  cent.  The  best 
engineering  authorities  in  the  country  agree  that.this  estimate 
is  conservative;  that  we  are  away  within  the  actual  facts 
when  we  assume  that  a  quarter  of  the  coal  used  in  this 
country  for  industrial  purposes  is  uselessly  wasted  at  the 
furnace  and  boiler.  This  means  that  our  requirement  could 
easily  be  met  with  75  per  cent  of  the  fuel  we  are  now  burn¬ 
ing.  One  hundred  and  fifty  million  tons  of  needlessly  wasted 
coal  is  “quite  some  considerable”  pile  of  fuel.  Loaded  upon 
freight  cars,  it  would  make  a  train  more  than  28,000  miles 
long.  Imagine  such  a  train  completely  belting  our  planet  with 
a  lap-over  of  3,000  miles,  every  car  of  it  loaded  to  the  full 
with  coal — with  the  commodity  that  is  now  worth  $60.00  a 
ton  and  upwards  in  the  countries  of  some  of  our  former 
European  allies.  The  preventable  waste  cf  fuel  in  the  United 
States  each  year  easily  exceeds  the  total  annual  output  of  all 
ot  the  Illinois  coal  fields.  What  adjective  can  we  use  as  a 
qualifier  for  waste  of  such  magnitude? 

MR.  PRESIDENT  and  CONGRESS,  you  spent  incredible 
sums  of  money  in  the  work  of  destruction.  WTe  furnished  that 


An  Appeal. 


11 


money  gladly  and  asked  very  few  questions  about  the  ways 
in  which  it  was  expended.  We  don’t  know  how  much  you 
wasted.  We  do  know  that  if  you  had  come  out  of  your  shells 
a  couple  of  years  earlier  you  could  have  planned  things  in  a 
really  efficient  way.  “Haste  means  waste,”  always,  and  you 
certainly  had  to  hurry  after  you  started.  You  did  in  one  year 
what  it  took  Germany  40  years  to  accomplish,  but,  Oh,  Mur¬ 
der!  what  it  cost  us  and  will  cost  our  grand-children!  This 
book  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  the  mistakes  that  were  made 
both  before  and  after  our  entry  into  the  war.  It  is  the  place 
to  discuss  a  mistake  that  you  are  making  at  this  moment.  We 
have  mentioned  your  waste  of  money  because  we  have  a  hunch 
that  when  the  time  comes  to  do  something  for  fuel  you  will 
go  on  one  of  your  periodical  sprees  of  parsimony  and  refuse 
to  do  anything  because  it  will  cost  something.  Ybu  are  either 
spending  money  like  a  drunken  lumberman  or  squeezing 
pennies  like  a  miser.  Some  Congressman  is  sure  to  bob  up 
pretty  soon  and  call  himself  the  “watch-dog  of  the  treasury.” 
He  will  have  a  numerous  following  both  in  and  out  of  Congress 
and  we  know  that  when  a  bill  is  presented  proposing  to  do 
something  for  fuel  it  will  be  opposed  because  the  thing  will 
cost  something.  It  surely  will  cost  our  people  something  if 
you  do  not  enact  and  enforce  a  law  to  insure  the  conservation 
and  proper  distribution  of  fuel. 

When  future  fuel  famines  come  let  the  responsibility  for 
them  be  placed  where  it  belongs — upon  the  President  and 
Congress  of  the  United  States. 

If  properly  utilized  there  is  fuel  enough  in  the  United 
States  to  meet  our  requirements  for  generations,  possibly 
until  science  can  discover  some  new  means  of  providing  the 
world  with  heat,  light  and  power.  Important  as  the  problem 
of  conservation  may  be,  it  is  not  of  such  pressing  and  imme¬ 
diate  importance  as  the  problems  of  production,  of  distribu¬ 
tion  and  of  cost  to  the  ultimate  consumer.  If  we  could  save 
the  150,000,000  of  tons  or  more  that  we  are  annually  wasting 
there  would  be  no  coal  shortage  in  the  United  States  and 
those  problems  would  be  settled.  The  cost  of  living  would 
go  down  because  fuel  enters  into  practically  everything  that  is 
necessary  to  life.  MR.  PRESIDENT  and  CONGRESS,  it  is 


12 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


your  business  as  stewards  of  our  National  Wealth  to  see  that 
fuel  is  not  wasted  and  that  it  is  so  distributed  that  there  shall 
never  be  occasion  again  for  want  and  suffering  in  our  country 
on  account  of  fuel  shortage. 


LOOK  OX  THIS  PICTURE. 


THE  INFINITE  FUEL  WASTE  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


An  Appeal 


1  o 
lo 


AM)  THEN  ON  THIS — 


SALVAGING  AN  INFNITESIMAL.  FRACTION  OF  THE 

INFINITE  WASTE. 

From  your  scats  in  a  comfortable  Pullman  you  have  seen 
this  picture  enacted  in  more  than  one  icy  railroad  yard — you 
have  seen  an  old  woman  with  a  shawl  over  her  head,  risking 
her  life  among'  the  moving  trains  for  a  basketful  of  coal. 


Mr.  President  and  Congress: 

Unless  you  do  something,  and  do  it  now,  we  see  a  belly- 
iull  of  trouble  ahead  of  us  for  this  fall  and  winter.  The 
country  will  be  w  ondering  about  Thanksgiving  time  what  on 
earth,  if  anything,  it  has  to  be  thankful  for.  Other  people  see 
a  fuel  famine  coming.  It  is  your  business  to  see  it  and  to 
take  steps  for  its  prevention. 


14  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 

The  following  is  quoted  from  an  editorial  in  a  leading 
daily  paper: 


COAL,  TROUBLES  AHEAD. 

The  coal  journals  are  now  warning-  the  public  that  “con¬ 
certed  action”  must  be  taken  if  consumers  are  to  be  protected 
from  a  very  great  increase  in  the  cost  of  coal  due  to  the  latest 
demands  put  forward  by  the  miners.  These  demands  involve  a 
six-hour  day  and  an  advance  of  40  to  60  per  cent  in  wages. 
The  seriousness  of  the  situation  is  indicated  by  the  fact  that 
there  have  already  been  strikes  for  the  sole  purpose  of  protest¬ 
ing  against  the  miners’  own  officials,  who  insist  that  the  present 
contract,  which  has  something  more  than  a  month  to  run,  shall 
be  carried  out. 

On  the  part  of  the  operators  it  is  intimated  that  rather  than 
engage  in  a  protracted  struggle  with  the  unions  just  at  a  time 
when  the  need  for  coal  is  beginning  to  be  greatest,  they  will 
simply  make  the  best  bargain  they  can  with  the  miners.  And  as 
usual,  the  extra  cost  will  be  passed  on  to  the  consumer. 

The  cost  will,  of  course,  affect  everybody.  Coal  has  become 
such  a  fundamental  factor  in  our  society  that  any  rise  in  price 
is  almost  immediately  reflected  in  the  price  of  everything  else. 
The  landlord  of  the  apartment  building  is  forced  to  advance  the 
rent;  the  utility  companies,  gas,  electric  light,  and  traction,  ask 
for  higher  rates;  the  railroads  must  seek  higher  revenues,  and 
every  manufacturing  concern  has  to  devise  means  of  increasing 
its  income.  In  Chicago  we  have  seen  the  retail  price  of  coal 
advance  from  about  $8  for  anthracite  in  1915  to  $10,  $11,  and 
even  $12  in  1918,  while  bituminous  went  from  $5  to  $6.50  in  the 
same  period.  Last  year  bituminous  was  approximately  $2.65  at 
the  mine;  this  year  it  is  $3.10.  Now  a  large  percentage  of  these 
increases  represent  the  increase  in  labor  cost.  Whereas  the 
miner  used  to  get  about  84  cents  a  ton,  he  now  gets  $1.45. 

And,  as  we  have  seen,  the  miner  now  wants  more  money 
for  a  shorter  day’s  work.  It  is  no  wonder  the  consumer  is  ask¬ 
ing  where  this  kind  of  thing  is  going  to  stop.  In  England  the 
British  government  was  recently  forced  to  add  6  shillings 
($1.50)  to  the  price  of  coal,  and  the  financial  journals  are  seri¬ 
ously  discussing  whether  British  industry  can  survive  so  heavy 
a  burden. 

One  anwer,  in  this  country  at  least,  is  the  development  of 
water  power.  With  cheap  and  plentiful  coal  the  use  of  steam 
has  in  many  cases  supplanted  the  use  of  water  power,  even 
Where  the  latter  was  available.  But  with  coal  expensive  and 
scarce  it  will  be  obviously  to  our  advantage  to  develop  water 
power  wherever  possible.  Such  a  development  would,  we  think, 
have  a  wholesome  effect  on  the  miners’  organizations,  which 
now  occupy  a  strategic  position  because  of  the  country’s  de¬ 
pendence  on  coal. 

Of  almost  equal  importance  is  for  the  country  to  learn  how 
to  use  coal  economically.  If  the  total  value  of  the  products 
that  have  gone  up  American  chimneys  in  smoke  could  be  com¬ 
puted  the  amount  would  be  staggering.  A  more  general  use  of 
coke  and  the  improvement  of  methods  of  coal  distillation  should 
be  conidered  in  our  efforts  to  effect  a  saving. 

In  the  meantime  we  would  suggest  that  the  wise  house¬ 
holder  will  not  delay  in  putting  in  his  winter’s  supply  of  coal. 
The  fuel  administration  has  practically  relinquished  its  control 
and  it  does  not  seem  likely  that  the  benevolent  system  of  dis¬ 
tribution  which  prevailed  last  winter  will  be  continued. 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


CHAPTER  I. 

WHY  YOUR  FUEL  IS  WASTED. 

The  purpose  of  this  book  is  to  show  WHY,  HOW  and 
WHERE  fuel  is  wasted  in  your  boiler  room.  Having  shown 
the  causes  of  loss  specific  means  of  stopping  the  wastes  will  be 
suggested.  A  diagnosis  of  the  sick  man’s  case  will  not  cure 
him.  There  must  be  a  prescription  following  the  diagnosis 
and  the  actual  taking  of  the  medicine  must  follow  the  pre¬ 
scription. 

The  sickest  thing  about  your  factory  plant  is  the  boiler 
room.  You  have  been  so  busy  putting  the  “prod”  into 
production  that  you  have  allowed  the  boiler  room  to  look  after 
itself  in  its  own  way.  And  the  result  is  exactly  what  might 
be  expected  in  such  circumstances.  You  are  wasting  just 
about  a  quarter  of  your  fuel.  When  I  say  “you,”  I  am  refer¬ 
ring  to  the  average  steam  power  plant  and  when  I  say  “a 
quarter  of  your  fuel”  I  am  referring  to  the  preventable  wastes 
that  occur  in  the  actual  burning  of  the  coal.  I  am  not  includ¬ 
ing  the  necessary  heat  losses,  which  are  considerable.  I  am 
not  including  the  losses  chargeable  to  the  boiler  proper  as 
distinct  from  the  furnace,  such  as  the  great  waste  due  to 
scale,  improper  baffling,  etc.,  or  the  loss  due  to  soot  which 
should  be  charged  jointly  to  the  furnace  and  boiler.  If  we  add 
these  other  wastes  to  the  25  per  cent  loss  that  must  be  charged 
against  the  fireman  and  the  furnace  the  total  will  be  a 
staggering  figure.  I  have  treated  elsewhere*  at  some  length 
of  these  “other  wastes,”  and  we  shall  be  reasonably  occupied 
in  this  book  if  we  do  justice  to  the  subject  of  furnace  efficiency 
and  allow  the  boiler  for  the  time  being  to  look  after  itself. 
Something  will  be  said  about  soot  and  scale  but  with  these 
exceptions  the  book  will  stick  to  its  title,  “How  to  Build  Up 
Furnace  Efficiency.” 


*See  the  magazine  publications  of  The  System  Company, 
Chicago. 

Never  read  a  book  until  you  have  read  the  author’s  preface. 


16 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


Fuel  Wastes  Between  the  Mine  and  the  Machine 

Prevent-  Non-pre- 
able  ventable 

losses  losses 
B.  T\  U.  B.  T.  U. 

DIRECT  FUEL  WASTES 

1  Post — By  weather  waste  between  mine 

and  factory .  290,000 

2  Lost— In  handling1  at  the  plant .  290,000  . 

3  Lost — In  the  ash — non-preventable .  284,200 

4  Lost — In  the  ash — preventable . .  ...  1,136.800  . 

5  Lost — By  radiation — non-preventable .  284,200 

6  Lost — By  radiation — preventable .  852,600  . 

7  Lost — By  incomplete  combustion .  204,908  . 

8  Lost — In  chimney  to  maintain  draft — 

non-preventable  .  3,410,400 

9  Lost — On  account  of  air  leakage  in  fur¬ 

nace  and  boiler  setting — preventable.  .  2,842,000  . 

10  Lost — On  account  of  air  excess  drawn 

through  grates — preventable .  2,842,000  . 

11  Lost — Due  to  heating  moisture  in  air  and 

coal  .  426.300 


Totals  .  8,168,308  4,695,100 

INDIRECT  FUEL  WASTES 
HEAT  ENERGY  LOSSES 

12  Lost — Due  to  short  circuiting  of  gases  in 

gas  passages  of  boiler .  322,732  . 

13  Lost — Due  to  soot  on  heating  surfaces..  .  .  1,126,561  . 

14  Lost — Due  to  scale  in  boiler .  1,452,293  . 

15  Lost — Due  to  incorrect  correlation  of  load 

to  draft  .  1,116,800  . 

16  Lost — Due  to  inability  of  boiler  to  reduce 

temperature  of  gases  below  that  of  the 

steam  in  boiler .  1,280,907 

17  Lost — Due  to  leakage  of  water  and  steam  216,685  . 

18  Lost — Due  to  friction  and  radiation  in 

steam  pipes — non-preventable .  216,685 

19  Lost — Due  to  friction  and  radiation  in 

steam  pipes — preventable  .  866,742  . 

20  Lost — With  engine  exhaust .  7,627,331 

21  Lost — Due  to  cylinder  condehsation  and 

radiation  .  715,063  . 

22  Lost — In  friction  at  engine — non-prevent¬ 

able  .  119,177 

23  Lost — In  friction  at  engine — preventable.  59,588  . 

24  Lost — In  transmission  from  engine  to 

machine— non-preventable  . 231,000 

25  Lost — In  transmission  from  engine  to 

machine— preventable  .  231,000  . 


Totals  .  6,107,464  9,475,100 

Grand  Totals  . 14,275,772  14,170,200 

Totals  of  all  losses,  preventable  and 

non-preventable  . 28,445,972  B.  t  .u. 

Delivered  to  the  machine .  554,028  B.  t.  u. 


Received  from  mine . 29,000,000  B.  t.  u. 

Note. — One  ton  of  coal  at  the  mine  is  assumed  to  contain 
29,000,000  British  Thermal  Units.  The  items  show  where  the 
losses  occur  and  the  relative  sizes  of  same  in  average  boiler  and 
engine  practice. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted 


17 


18 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


I  use  the  expression  “Build  Up”  because  a  really  con¬ 
structive  process  is  involved.  There  is  a  place  to  begin,  a 
plan  to  be  pursued  and  an  end  to  be  attained.  If  you  do  not 
start  in  the  proper  way  at  the  right  place  you  will  never  have 
efficiency  in  your  boiler  room.  And  after  you  get  efficiency 
if  you  do  not  follow  the  proper  method  you  will  not  be  able 
to  keep  it.  Your  plant  will  “back-slide,"  if  I  may  borrow  that 
term  from  “Billy”  Sunday.  I  wish  to  make  it  very  clear  that 
it  is  one  thing  to  “attain”  efficiency  and  quite  another  thing 
to  “maintain”  it. 

My  statement  that  a  quarter  of  the  coal  is  needlessly 
wasted  in  burning  may  be  challenged  by  some  people.  I  shall 
not  take  it  back;  I  have  data  covering  hundreds  of  power 
plants  and  I  can  prove  it.  It  is  always  dangerous  to  write 
a  statement  which  on  its  face  appears  improbable.  However 
reasonable  your  other  statements  may  be  the  one  that  sounds 
extravagant  may  queer  all  of  them.  The  reader  is  asked  to 
accept  that  estimate  of  25  per  cent  as  applying  to  his  own 
power  plant  until  he  has  made  the  investigations  suggested 
in  this  book  and  proved  to  his  own  satisfaction  that  his  own 
power  plant  is  an  exception  to  the  general  rule. 

Is  one-quarter  of  your  annual  coal  pile  worth  saving? 
It  is  a  waste  of  good  paper  to  print  such  a  fool  question.  Of 
course  it  is.  Every  cent  that  the  big  pile  of  fuel  represents 
was  skinned  from  the  dividend  account.  Just  figure  a  moment. 
One  thousand  dollars  thrown  away  in  your  boiler  room  must 
be  replaced  by  another  thousand  earned  from  your  business. 
That  thousand  dollars  earned  means  something  in  volume  of 
orders  and  volume  of  output.  And  if  your  total  coal  bill  is 
only  four  thousand  dollars  per  annum  you  are  a  relatively 
small  bore  institution.  One  large  factory  in  Illinois  made  an 
actual  saving  of  $73,000  the  first  year  that  the  methods  to  be 
described  in  this  book  were  employed  in  its  boiler  room  and 
that  year  the  plant  earned  its  first  profit. 

The  big  industries  of  the  country  have  made  a  discovery. 
They  have  learned  that  the  profits  of  the  present  depend  very 

“Kindly  turn  out  the  lights  when  leaving 
the  office,  we  need  the  current  to  sell.” 

Sign  in  the  offices  of  the  West  Penn  Rys. 

Co.,  Connellsville,  Pa. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


19 


largely  upon  the  practice  of  economies  and  that  the  profits  of 
the  future  will  depend  entirely  upon  such  practice.  They  are 
going  after  savings  in  all  departments  while  many  of  the 
smaller  manufacturers  have  yet  to  learn  that  there  is  such  a 
word  as  “economy”  in  the  dictionary.  This  waking  up  in  the 
big  industries  is  one  of  the  reasons  why  big  business  is  as  big 
as  it  is  and  why  the  big  fellows  are  eating  up  the  little  ones. 
I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  all  of  the  big  manufacturing  indus¬ 
tries  are  really  economical  in  the  use  of  fuel.  The  majority 
are  extremely  wasteful.  I  do  mean  to  say  that  the  big  enter¬ 
prise  is  beginning  to  scrutinize  its  coal  account  and  supervise 
its  boiler  rooms. 

When  our  battleships  made  their  celebrated  trip  around 
the  world  it  was  discovered  by  the  fleet  engineer  that  certain 
of  the  vessels  were  much  more  wasteful  of  fuel  than  others. 
There  was  nothing  like  uniformity  in  the  coal  consumed  per 
knot  steamed,  even  among  ships  that  were  almost  the  exact 
duplicates  of  each  other.  There  was  a  difference  of  20  per 
cent  in  the  coal  consumption  of  certain  sister  ships.  Here 
was  food  for  thought  and  the  Bureau  of  Steam  Engineering 
began  thinking. 

The  following  is  quoted  from  an  article  by  Lieut.  Com¬ 
mander  W.  B.  Tardy,  U.  S..  N.,  published  in  the  Engineering 
Magazine: 

“This  recently  inaugurated  activity  has  already  resulted  in 
the  installation  of  pyrometers  and  gas  analysis  apparatus  on 
hoard  all  ships;  has  caused  the  building  or  improving  of  fire- 
room  timing  devices;  has  caused  a  study  of  combustion  and  fir¬ 
ing  problems  which  has  led  to  a  location  and  elimination  of 
nearly  all  the  air  leaks  in  furnaces  and  boiler  settings,  the 
determination  of  the  proper  amount  of  coal  for  a  charge  at  vari¬ 
ous  speeds,  the  correct  firing  interval,  the  correct  and  normal 
opening  of  damper  and  furnace  and  ash-pan  doors  when  fires 
are  not  being  replenished  or  worked;  has  demonstrated  the 
saving  of  fuel  possible  by  manipulating  the  same  and  ash-pan 
doors  when  coal  is  being  fired. 

“On  January  1,  1908,  the  average  battleship  knots  per  ton  of 
coal  fired  was  2.88;  on  July  1,  1910,  this  average  was  3.77  With 
ships  20  per  cent  larger  on  the  latter  date  than  on  the  former 
date.” 

The  battle-ship  now  steams  31  per  cent  farther  on  a  ton  of 
coal  than  in  1908.  This  is  equivalent  to  an  actual  fuel  saving 
of  about  24  per  cent  as  an  average  for  all  ships.  The  improve¬ 
ment  on  some  of  the  ships  must  have  been  far  in  excess  of 
these  figures. 


20 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


I  might  go  on  indefinitely  with  these  illustrations  showing 
what  it  is  possible  to  do  and  what  is  actually  being  done  to 
decrease  the  primary  cost  of  power.  Some  of  the  smaller 
plants  furnish  illustrations  even  more  remarkable  than  those 
offered  by  the  big  ones. 

In  a  small  Ohio  town  there  are  two  small  factories. 
They  manufacture  the  same  kind  of  product.  The  larger  of 
the  two  plants  burns  one  ton  of  coal  per  day  and  the  smaller 
tburns  seven.  In  a  Southern  city  there  are  two  ice  plants. 
Due  gets  three  tons  of  ice  from  a  ton  of  coal  and  the  other 
gets  ten  tons.  The  ten  ton  man  is  getting  rich  and  buying 
more  ice  plants.  Some  day  he  will  buy  the  piddling  three  ton 
plant  and  put  it  on  a  ten  ton  basis. 

Power  is  the  largest  single  item  of  expense  in  most  manu¬ 
facturing  industries  and  fuel  represents  about  70  per  cent  of 
the  total  cost  of  power.  And  the  price  of  fuel  is  going  up. 
Nothing  short  of  the  discovery  of  a  new  source  of  power  can 
stop  the  rising  tendency  of  coal  prices.  You  face  the  grim 
facts  of  sharp  and  merciless  competition  and  of  increasing 
fuel  costs.  The  alarm  clocks  are  going  off  in  other  establish¬ 
ments  and  it  is  time  for  you  to  wake  up.  If  you  sleep  too 
long,  waking  up  won’t  help  you.  The  other  man  will  be  so 
far  ahead  in  the  race  that  you  can  never  overtake  him. 

I  have  been  all  over  the  United  States  and  Canada  since 
the  European  war  started,  and  I  now  tell  you  that  a  move¬ 
ment  toward  efficiency  has  started  in  America  and  is  gaining 
recruits  every  hour.  This  movement  has  gone  clear  through 
certain  lines  of  industry.  It  has  not  made  its  appearance  at 
all  in  other  lines.  What  about  the  industry  in  which  you  are 
engaged,  and  in  particular  what  about  YOU?  “Don’t  wait 
to  time  your  fiddle  until  the  concert  has  started.”* 

Let  us  hope  that  American  initiative,  coupled  with  the 
movement  for  efficiency  that  has  been  started  in  this  country, 
will  $ull  uS  through  the  terrific  struggle  with  the  Germanized 
Industrial  and  business  forces  which  the  prophets  say  will 
soon  be  arrayed  against  us. 

Muqh  just  criticism  has  been  leveled  against  the  present 
propaganda  of  “scientific  management.”  There  is,  in  fact,  a 


*Harvey  Grant. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted.  21 

COAL  PRODUCTION  AND  POPULATION  INCREASE  COMPARED 


o  O  O 

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Of 

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and 

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continue  to  rise. 

Every  lime  a  baby  is  born,  the  price  of  eoai  ^oes  ii]>. 


COAL  PRODUCTION  PER  CAPITA  OF  POPULATION 


22  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


What  you  pay  for  wages,  re-  What  you  pay  for  wages,  re 
pairs  and  incidentals  in  pairs,  supplies,  etc.,  in  the 

the  boiler  room.  engine  room. 


It’s  your  money.  “I  should  bibble!” 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


23 


lot  of  “fish”  in  much  of  the  efficiency  talk  and  a  great  deal 
of  “con”  in  much  of  the  economy  talk,  especially  where  the 
“efficiency”  and  “economy”  men  have  something  to  sell  in  the 
way  of  service  or  apparatus.  The  quacks  and  extremists  are 
hurting  this  movement  as  they  have  hurt  all  others.  And  yet, 
nowithstanding  the  “fish”  and  the  “con”  of  it,  “scientific  man¬ 
agement”  in  its  real  and  its  broad  sense  is  the  most  important 
industrial  fact  of  the  present  century.  One  proof  of  this  is 
that  both  big  and  little  business  are  going  in  for  it.  “Scien¬ 
tific  management”  means  more  than  “motion  studies”  and  the 
speeding  up  of  workmen.  It  means  anything  and  everything 
that  tends  to  make  a  dollar’s  worth  of  material,  of  time  or  of 
effort  yield  more  results  than  it  ever  yielded  before.  A  real 
revolution  is  in  progress  and  it  is  good  to  be  a  participator  in  it. 

There  was  a  time  when  the  manufacturers  of  this  country 
were  not  interested  to  any  degree  in  the  subject  of  economy. 
Things  were  too  new.  Industrial  development  was  too  rapid. 
Competition  was  not  intense.  The  material  resources  of  our 
country  seemed  inexhaustible.  We  stupidly  blundered  on 
while  all  around  us  waste  of  every  description  held  royal 
carnival.  The  soil  was  half  cultivated  and  less  than  half 
cared  for.  Our  great  forests  of  splendid  pine  were  ruthlessly 
destroyed.  The  sky  was  red  with  flaming  gas  wells  in  Indiana 
and  Ohio.  No  one  seemed  to  think  that  our  rich  soil  would 
ever  become  impoverished;  that  the  time  might  arrive  when 
we  could  not  live  in  wooden  houses  because  there  would  be 
no  suitable  wood  with  which  to  build  them;  that  our  great 
stores  of  natural  gas  would  ever  become  exhausted.  We  went 
blindly  forward  from  year  to  year,  wasting  enough  to  feed 
and  clothe  half  of  Europe.  The  time  has  come  to  pay  the  piper 
and  it  is  a  mighty  long  bill  that  the  gentleman  is  presenting. 

I  have  referred  to  the  general  trend  of  the  present 
efficiency  movement  because  of  its  compelling  importance  and 
in  order  that  what  is  to  follow  in  this  book  may  gain  some 
emphasis. 

Why  is  it  that  so  much  of  your  fuel  is  wasted?  If  that 
question  cannot  be  answered  we  might  as  well  ring  off  and 
hang  up  because  all  of  our  efforts  will  be  useless. 

Let  us  suppose  that  I  visit  your  factory  plant  tomorrow'. 


24 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


I  call  upon  the  manager  and  he  receives  me  courteously.!  I 
tell  him  that  a  quarter  of  his  fuel  is  being  wasted  and  he 
admits  it.  He  is  “busy”  and  he  passes  me  along  to  the  super¬ 
intendent.  That  individual  is  “busy”  also.  He  is  worrying 
about  the  delivery  on  some  big  order.  He  sends  me  to  the 
engineer  and  I  know  from  his  actions  that  he  was  glad  to  get 
rid  of  me. 

I  find  the  engineer  with  a  Stillson  wrench  in  one  hand 
and  a  pair  of  pliers  in  the  other.  He  is  the  “wet  nurse”  to 


I  he  is  the  wet  nurse  to 

e  v  <?  ry+hmq  cl  eetn  cal  a.jr\d  ;m<?ch  an  i ca  1 


ant. 


T 


+•  - 


rjnr 


everything  electrical  and  mechanical  about  the  plant.  He 
“hasn’t  time”  to  supervise  the  boiler  room.  He  is  too  busy 
supervising  the  apparatus  that  the  boiler  room  serves  to  pay 
any  attention  to  the  thing  that  is  doing  the  serving.  Of  course 
they  waste  coal  in  the  boiler  room,  but  look  at  the  “dagoes” 
and  “niggers”  that  they  are  forced  to  employ  as  firemen.  The 
manager  is  satisfied  with  that  kind  of  service.  The  “old  man” 
comes  to  the  surface  once  a  month  and  blows  like  a  whale 
about  the  coal  bill.  Aside  from  this  monthly  disturbance,  all 
is  quiet  along  the  Potomac.  Our  conversation  is  cut  short  by 
the  engineer’s  telephone  and  I  go  to  the  boiler  room.  I  tell 
the  fireman  that  he  is  burning  too  much  coal  and  he  indig¬ 
nantly  denies  it.  He  has  been  firing  boilers  for  twenty  years 
and  says  he  knows  his  business.  But  would  I  just  look  at  the 
stuff  the  coal  dealer  is  delivering? 


I  don’t  know  who  invented  the  game  of  “passing  the  buck,” 
but  I  do  know  who  plays  it. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


25 


And  so  I  go  to  the  coal  dealer  and  ask  him  about  it.  He 
tells  me  that  he  is  delivering  the  very  grade  of  fuel  called  for 
in  his  contract,  that  it  is  good  fuel  and  the  plant  has  no  kick 
coming.  And  thus  I  make  the  complete  circuit  of  your  estab¬ 
lishment,  like  a  kitten  chasing  its  tail.  I  have  made  that 
circuit  of  power  plants  so  many  times  that  I  am  getting  dizzy. 
Everybody  lays  it  on  the  dog  and  nobody  wants  to  be  the  goat. 
And  that  is  “WHY  YOUR  FUEL  IS  WASTED.” 

A  reform  is  necessary  in  your  boiler  room  and  in  order  to 
initiate  it  there  must  be  an  initiator.  Absolutely  nothing  can 
be  hoped  for  until  somebody  starts  something. 

I  was  talking  some  time  ago  with  a  consulting  engineer 
in  the  city  of  Philadelphia.  He  said:  “I  get  plenty  of  work, 
charge  high  fees,  and  suppose  I  ought  to  be  satisfied;  but  I 
don’t  like  my  business.  The  manager  of  a  power  plant,  in  a 
fit  of  reform,  employs  me  to  make  an  investigation.  I  make 
a  lot  of  recommendations,  most  of  which  if  carried  out  would 
involve  the  expenditure  of  very  little  money.  My  bill  is  paid 
promptly  and  I  call  again  in  a  month  to  see  how  the  plant 
is  coming  on.  Not  one  thing  that  I  have  recommended  has 
been  done  or  ever  will  be  done.  I  like  to  see  my  clients  get 
some  benefit  from  my  services,  but  in  only  about  one  job  out  of 
five  are  my  recommendations  actually  carried  out.”* 

Every  consulting  engineer  in  the  country  who  has  recom¬ 
mended  improvements  in  the  power  departments  of  factory 
plants  will  appreciate  the  viewpoint  of  the  Philadelphia  man. 

Some  one  is  primarily  responsible  for  the  fuel  wastes  in 
your  boiler  room.  Let  us  proceed  by  a  process  of  elimination 
and  see  if  we  can  find  the  guilty  man.  We  will  start  with 
the  fireman. 

What  was  he  hired  for?  To  make  steam,  of  course. 
There  is  nothing  in  your  contract  with  the  fireman  that 
specifies  anything  about  making  steam  with  efficiency.  One 
fireman  will  burn  a  lot  of  coal  and  make  a  little  steam. 
Another  will  burn  a  little  coal  and  make  a  lot  of  steam. 
There  is  that  difference  in  firemen  and  you  know  it.  What 
method  have  you  of  differentiating  between  your  firemen  and 
comparing  the  efficiency  of  one  man  with  that  of  another? 

*“He  who  washes  a  donkey’s  head  wastes  his  soap.” 


26 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


AVhat  steps  do  you  take  to  insure  that  every  fireman  is  an 
efficient  fireman?  Not  a  single  step.  You  demand  STEAM 
and  you  take  efficiency  like  a  tapeworm  takes  it  dinner — just 
as  it  is  handed  to  you. 

Your  fireman  knows  that  if  he  does  not  supply  enough 
steam  he  will  hear  from  headquarters.  He  knows  further, 
that  as  long  as  he  does  supply  enough  steam,  nobody  will 
come  near  him  to  disturb  him.  What  the  steam  that  he  fur¬ 
nishes  may  cost  you  does  not  concern  him.  Why  should  it 
concern  him?  If  you  are  satisfied  to  pay  the  coal  bills  why 
should  he  worry  about  them?  It  is  your  coal  and  your  money. 
Now,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  your  fireman  belie/es  that  he  is  an 
efficient  operative.  He  even  takes  a  little  pride  in  the  skill 
that  he  thinks  he  possesses.  But  he  measures  his  efficiency 
by  his  ability  to  keep  the  arrow  of  the  steam  gage  pointing  at 
100  pounds.  He  does  not  think  of  steam  in  terms  of  coal.  He 
does  not  think  of  coal  in  terms  of  money.  He  places  coal  in 
the  same  category  with  clinkers  and  ashes.  It  is  just  so  much 
heavy  stuff  to  be  handled  in  the  course  of  the  day’s  work. 
And  what  other  concept  can  you  expect  the  fireman  to  have 
of  your  fuel  pile?  As  fast  as  one  pile  of  coal  is  burned  another 
automatically  takes  its  place.  The  coal  is  always  there  and 
the  fireman  is  given  a  shovel  and  “carte  blanche”  to  help 
himself  to  it. 

We  cannot  blame  the  fireman  for  this  quarter  of  your  coal 
that  he  is  wasting.  We  absolve  him  absolutely.  He  does  the 
best  he  knows  how  and  his  performance  is  as  good  as  the 
teaching  he  received.  By  the  way,  who  taught  your  fireman? 
Some  other  fireman,  of  course.  Who  taught  the  other  fellow? 
And  there  you  are.  And  there  you  will  remain  with  your  25 
per  cent  fuel  waste  until  somebody  shows  your  fireman  that 
it  is  less  work  to  shovel  three  tons  of  coal  than  it  is  to  shovel 
four;  that  his  labor  will  be  reduced  as  his  efficiency  is 
increased,  and  that  if  he  would  work  his  muscles  less  he  must 
work  his  head  more.  Most  firemen  are  afflicted  with  the 
hookworm  and  the  sleeping  sickness.  “Do  the  minimum  of 
work  in  the  maximum  of  time  and  God  bless  pay  day.”  This 
is  the  fireman’s  creed  and  for  that  matter  it  is  the  creed  of 
almost  everybody.  It  is  human  nature’s  creed,  and  if  you 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


27 


want  efficiency  anywhere  you  must  learn  how  to  deal  with 
human  nature.  Human  nature  knows  exactly  how  to  deal 
with  you. 

In  the  last  chapter  of  this  book  I  shall  tell  you  about 
methods  that  have  been  successfully  used  to  convert  the  very 
lowest  grades  of  men  into  expert  firemen.  I  muit  not  be 
understood  to  mean  that  a  fireman  is  necessarily  a  low  grade 
man.  It  is  well  to  remember  that  a  man’s  real  status  is  not 
fixed  by  his  environment  or  occupation.  I  respect  firemen. 
I  have  taken  my  turn  at  the  boiler  furnace  and  I  am  not 
ashamed  of  it.  On  the  contrary,  I  am  proud  of  it.  I  know 
the  fireman’s  point  of  view  to  a  red  hair  and  I  know  firemen. 
There  are  good  men  among  them.  They  will  listen  to  any 
man  if  they  are  convinced  that  his  experience  in  the  boiler 
room  is  broader  than  their  own.  It  doesn’t  require  much 
prophetic  vision  to  do  this  bit  of  accurate  prophesying:  The 
time  will  come  when  men  will  graduate  from  the  engine 
room  to  the  boiler  room  instead  of  the  other  way  around  as 
at  present,  when  watch  firemen  will  receive  better  pay  than 
watch  engineers  and  when  the  highest  salaried  man  in  the 
entire  power  department  will  be  the  boiler  room  superin¬ 
tendent.  That  time  has  already  arrived  in  some  power  plants. 
They  have  seen  the  universal  mistake  in  arranging  the  per- 


The  wrong  end  of  the  horse. 


28 


How  to  Build  U y  Furnace  Efficiency. 


On  Sundays  he  worships  with 
his  head  ins \d<?  an  open 
engine  cylinder 

emergency  repairs.  On  Sundays  he  worships  with  his  head 
inside  an  opened  engine  cylinder.  I  have  known  an  engineer 
to  do  a  72-hour  stunt  in  a  power  plant  without  a  wink  of  sleep, 
a  word  of  complaint  or  a  whisper  of  commendation.  Such 


sonnel  of  the  power  force  amt  they  are  now  hitching  up  the 
cart  to  the  right  end  of  thn  xiorse. 

Let  us  now  proceed  t  >  determine  the  guilt  or  innocence 
of  the  engineer  as  respect: i  your  25  per  cent  fuel  loss. 

An  engineer  is  a  man  who  is  paid  a  mighty  little  for 
doing  a  mighty  lot  and  sometimes  earns  less  than  his  salary. 
The  chances  are  that  he  rose  from  the  position  of  oiler  and 
never  served  an  apprenticeship  in  the  boiler  room.  When  he 
learned  engineering  it  was  not  considered  necessary  that  an 
engineer  should  know  anything  about  combustion.  In  those 
days  the  theory  of  combustion  was  left  to  the  college  profes¬ 
sors  and  the  practice  of  it  to  the  firemen’s  union.  The 
engineer  now  complains  that  he  has  little  opportunity  to  post 
up  on  either  the  theory  or  the  practice.  He  might  find  time 
for  a  little  study  on  Thanksgiving  and  Christmas,  but  he  is 
busy  at  the  plant  on  those  festive  occasions,  supervising 

"  T/  p  |  io  f  1  \  \ 

Oh'  for  a  thousand  tongues 
Pod  ga,st  1 t  to  Halif  ay  1  mashed  my  thumD 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted 


29 


THERE  WAS  A  TIRE  WHEN  THE  THEORY  OF  COMBUSTION 
WAS  LEFT  TO  THE  COLLEGE  FROFESSORS  AND  THE 
PRACTICE  OF  IT  TO  THE  NIEN  IN  THE  BOILER  ROOM.  THE 
ENGINEER  AND  MANAGER  DID  NOT  WORRY  THEMSELVES 
WITH  EITHER  THE  THEORY  OR  THE  PRACTICE. 


THE  “FACULTY  OF  THEORY. 


“Boys,  it’s  your  business  to  keep  up  steam. 
There’s  the  coal  pile.  Go  to  it.” 

THE  “FACULTY”  OF  PRACTICE. 


in  i 


■ ,  i 


30 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


things  are  not  unusual.  They  are  expected  of  engineers  when 
the  emergency  arises  and  are  expected  by  them.  They  are  a 
part  of  the  price  that  a  man  must  pay  for  the  privilege  of 
being  an  engineer.  I  have  said  that  I  respect  firemen.  I 
respect  engineers  also,  and  I  have  a  great  many  warm  friends 
among  them,  but  I  cannot  absolve  the  engineer  for  that  25 
per  cent  fuel  loss  as  I  absolve  the  fireman. 

Now,  Mr.  Engineer,  please  stand  and  be  sworn!  If  you 
want  what  is  going,  you  must  take  what  is  coming: 

THE  ENGINEER’S  CATECHISM. 

1.  What  is  the  efficiency  of  your  boiler  furnaces? 

2.  What  draft  in  your  boiler  furnaces  will  carry  your 
load  and  burn  the  least  coal? 

3.  Have  you  calibrated  your  boiler  dampers  and  the  main 
breeching  damper? 

4.  Have  you  equalized  the  draft  among  the  boilers? 

5.  How  much  air  is  leaking  through  your  boiler  settings? 

6.  When  is  an  air  leak  an  aid  to  efficiency? 

7.  Where  are  the  air  leaks  that  are  injuring  efficiency? 

8.  How  much  too  much  air  are  your  firemen  permitting 
to  flow  through  the  fuel  bed? 

9.  Do  your  firemen  admit  more  air  than  is  necessary  at 
the  furnace,  either  above  or  below  the  fire? 

10.  How  much  excess  air  from  all  sources  are  you  heating 
and  sending  up  the  chimney? 

11.  How  thick  should  the  particular  coal  you  are  burning 
be  carried  on  the  particular  grates  you  are  using? 

12.  Are  you  using  the  coal  best  adapted  to  your  condi¬ 
tions? 

13.  Are  you  using  the  grate  best  adapted  to  your  condi¬ 
tions? 

14.  Should  the  coal  you  are  using  be  fired  dry  or  wet  for 
greatest  economy? 

15.  Is  the  grate  surface  just  right  for  the  highest 
economy? 

16.  How  much  and  what  kind  of  combustible  is  passing 
up  your  chimney? 

17.  What  are  the  specific  causes  of  the  smoke  you  are 
making  ? 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 

i 


31 


18.  Is  the  low  evaporation  of  which  you  complain,  due  to 
the  boiler,  the  furnace,  the  coal  or  the  fireman? 

19.  If  you  don’t  know  why  the  evaporation  is  low,  how 
in  the  name  of  Pluto  will  you  proceed  to  increase  the  evapo¬ 
ration  ? 

20.  How  much  coal  is  your  poor  fireman  wasting  and  how 
much  more  can  your  best  fireman  save? 

21.  Will  you  state,  under  oath,  that  the  boiler  headers 
are  ALWAYS  properly  packed  and  the  setting  and  baffling 
ALWAYS  in  proper  condition  before  your  boilers  are  put 
into  service? 

22.  Aren’t  you  ashamed  of  yourself  if  you  are  unable  to 
answer  all  of  the  foregoing  questions? 

Now,  Mr.  Engineer,  tell  me  candidly  as  man  to  man:  Does 
not  every  one  of  those  questions  have  a  vital  bearing  on  your 
employer’s  coal  bill?  If  such  is  the  case,  does  not  your  duty 
to  your  employer  and  your  status  as  an  engineer  require  that 
you  find  the  answers  to  those  questions  if  you  have  not  already 
found  them?  And  should  not  every  engineer  who  claims  to 
have  passed  the  kindergarten  department  of  power  practice  be 
able  to  answer  them?  And  didn’t  the  Creator  waste  a  lot  of 
good  mud  in  making  an  engineer  who  cannot  answer  them? 
And  if  you  cannot  answer  those  questions  how  will  you  feel 
when  the  boss  gets  a  copy  of  this  book  and  springs  the 
“catechism”  on  you? 

Every  engineer  might  be  a  qualified  combustion  man. 
Combustion  engineering,  as  I  shall  try  to  show,  consists  in  the 
application  of  ordinary  horse  sense  to  the  every-day  prob¬ 
lems  of  fuel  burning.  Any  man  with  a  fair  understanding  of 
boilers  and  furnaces  and  with  a  real  desire  to  learn  what 
constitutes  economical  combustion  can  qualify  in  a  very  short 
time  as  a  practical  combustion  engineer.  To  acquire  the 
theory  of  the  subject  would  of  course  take  some  time  longer. 
In  the  last  year  I  have  traveled  over  a  large  section  of  the 
United  States  and  Canada.  I  have  talked  with  hundreds  of 
engineers  and  have  been  present  at  the  meetings  of  many 

If  you  don’t  know  Combustion,  you  haven’t  learned  the 
alphabet  of  steam  engineering1. 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


90 

engineers’  associations.  Combustion  is  considered  everywhere 
the  very  livest  subject  that  can  be  mentioned.  I  quote  the 
exact  language  of  one  engineer:  “The  time  has  come  when 
the  steam  engineer  must  interest  himself  in  combustion, 
otherwise  engineering  will  not  interest  itself  in  him.” 


THE  ALPHABET  OF  STEAM  ENGINEERING. 

(Contributed  to  POWER  by  the  Author  and  reprinted  here  with 
the  customary  apologies.) 


A  stands  for  AMBITION  to  reach  the  top  quick, 

Where  the  pickers  are  few  and  the  prizes  hang  thick. 

B  stands  for  BOILER.  You  put  water  in  it. 

And  if  you  don’t  watch  there’ll  be  scale  in  a  minute. 

C  stands  for  COMBUSTION.  To  start  it  you  scratch 
On  the  seat  of  your  pants  with  a  Lucifer  match. 

D  stands  for  DOLLARS  and  also  for  DOUGH. 

You  can  earn  quite  a  lot  when  your  business  you  know. 
E  stands  for  EFFICIENT,  a  term  that  I  wot  .  I 

Is  used  very  glibly  by  some  who  are  not.  ■  c. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


F  stands  for  FURNACE  and  FIREMAN,  too; 

When  they  both  tend  to  business  the  coal  man  looks  blue. 

G  stands  for  GASES  that  go  up  the  flue. 

Look  out  or  you’ll  waste  a  heat  unit  or  two. 

H  stands  for  the  HOLES  that  let  air  through  the  fire. 

You  must  watch  for  such  air  holes;  with  waste  they 
conspire. 

I  stands  for  INTENTION  to  stop  up  the  leaks; 

You  can  do  it  today.  Why  defer  it  for  weeks? 

J  stands  for  the  JOY  that  the  manager  fills 

When  the  month’s  balance  sheet  shows  some  small  fuel 
bills. 

K  stands  for  the  KNOWLEDGE  that  some  engineers 
Acquire  quite  quickly  while  others  take  years. 

L  stands  for  the  LIGHTS  that  in  dark  corners  gleam 
When  the  chief  engineer  knows  the  cost  of  the  steam. 

M  stands  for  the  MOMENT  to  stop  fuel  waste; 

The  moment  is  Now  and  the  password  is  “Haste.” 

N  stands  for  the  NOTION  at  one  time  supreme 

That  the  plant  was  all  right  when  it  made  enough  steam. 

O  stands  for  OXYGEN;  wide  is  its  use. 

“Oxy”  means  “acid”  and  “gen”  means  “produce.” 

P  stands  for  POWER.  It  comes  from  a  press, 

And  sometimes  from  a  Corliss  or  turbine,  I  guess. 

Q  stands  for  the  thing  that  they  call  QUESTIONNAIRE. 

You  fill  out  the  blanks  and  then  put  up  a  prayer. 

R  stands  for  REPAIRS  which  you  ought  in  all  reason 
Get  out  of  the  way  in  the  slack  summer  season. 

S  stands  for  the  STEAM  you  waste  coal  to  produce 
And  you  waste  the  same  steam  when  you  put  it  to  use. 

T  stands  for  TURBINE.  Our  friend  Jamie  Watt 

Would  gasp  could  he  see  us  shoot  steam  through  a  pot. 

U  stands  for  UPTAKE.  For  a  sample  of  gas 
For  your  Orsat,  avoid  it,  and  use  the  last  pass. 

V  stands  for  the  thing  that  we  often  call  VIM. 

Without  it  you  sink.  When  you  have  it  you  swim. 

W  stands  for  WATER.  Beginning  this  year 
We  all  have  to  drink  it  and  play  it  is  beer. 

X  stands  for  XPERT  and  XPERIENCE,  too. 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


When  you’ve  gathered  the  second  the  first  becomes  you. 

Y  stands  for  the  jaw-breaker  YOUGHIOGHENY, 
it’s  a  kind  of  coal  out  in  West  Pennsylvany. 

Vi  stands  for  ZEST  for  the  work  we  are  in, 

And  with  Zest  comes  Success.  NOW  LET’S  GO  IN  AND 
WIN! 

You  can  begin  to  qualify”  by  commencing  to  study  the 
boiler  plant  now  in  your  charge.  I  know  you  are  busy,  but 
tomorrow  you  will  be  busier.  There  is  only  one  way  to  do  it. 
Wake  up  and  get  up.  Gird  up  your  loins,  and  go  to  it.  Better 
watch  that  fellow  in  the  boiler  room,  because  he  is  studying 
fuel  economy  and  he  may  be  slated  to  get  your  job.  I  call 
to  mind  two  engineers  who  lived  in  our  town.  One  man  was 
always  climbing  up,  the  other  slipping  down.  The  climber 
started  at  the  foot  like  Schwab  and  other  winners.  The  man 
who  wants  to  reach  the  top  must  start  with  the  beginners. 
They  gave  him  hard  and  dirty  work — they  kept  him  on  the 
jump.  He  wheeled  in  coal  and  then  he  wheeled  the  ashes  to 
the  dump.  He  plugged  along  from  day  to  day;  he  didn’t  kick 
or  shirk.  They  found  at  last  the  fellow  had  some  interest  in 
his  work.  And  so  they  moved  him  up  a  notch  and  hired  a 
husky  toiler  to  push  the  creaking  barrow  while  the  climber 
fired  the  boiler.  The  work  was  heavy,  hard  and  hot;  he  never 
seemed  to  mind  it.  “There’s  some  best  way  to  do  this  stunt,  by 
jinks,”  he  said.  “I’ll  find  it.  There’s  some  best  way  to  burn 
this  coal  and  manage  drafts  and  fires.  I’ll  find  that  way  and 
then  I’ll  do  just  what  this  job  requires.”  I  need  not  tell  in 
detail  how  this  climber  clambered  higher.  He  learned  each 
new  job  in  its  turn  the  way  he  learned  to  fire  the  furnace  in 
that  boiler  room.  They  could  not  keep  him  down  and  pretty 
soon  a  man’s  size  job  had  called  him  from  our  town.  The 
city  field  that  beckoned  found  him  ready  to  deliver  and  now 
lie’s  rich  and  sails  his  yacht  and  owns  and  drives  a  flivver. 
The  man  who  mixes  thought  with  work — just  get  this  through 
your  noodle — will  rise  at  last  to  run  the  ranch  and  boss  the 
whole  caboodle. 

It  hurts  my  kindly  heart  to  write  about  the  other  guy.  He 
had  a  pull  or  something  and  he  started  rather  high,  where  pay 
was  good  and  work  was  light;  he  might  have  risen  higher  but 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


85 

lit*  lacked  the  stuff  that  makes  success — he  lacked  ambition's 
fire.  And  while  the  climber  toiled  and  thought,  then  studied 
like  the  dickens,  the  other  shirked  and  wished  for  night,  the 
bright  lights  and  the  chickens.  The  man  who  stops  to  watch 
the  clock  or  listen  for  the  whistle  may  dine  on  porterhouse 
today — some  day  he’ll  dine  on  gristle.  Some  men  are  paid,  for 
what  they  do  and  some  for  what  they  know.  The  head:  is 
greater  than  the  hands;  this  always  will  be  so.  It  doesn’t  cut 


NOW  HE’S  PUNCHING  HOLES  IN  DOUGHNUTS. 


86  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

a  bit  of  ice,  how  high  you’re  elevated,  or  what  your  pull,  the 
skids  are  there  and  always  lubricated.  So  while  the  climber 
clambered  toward  the  higher  jobs  and  got’em,  the  other  fellow 
on  the  skids  was  headed  for  the  bottom  and  reached  it  in  no 
time  at  all — in  less  than  nothing  flat.  Now  he’s  punching 
holes  in  doughnuts — and  he  isn’t  fit  for  that. 

Just  one  thing  more,  before  I  talk  to  the  General  Manager. 
If  you  wish  to  institute  any  reforms  in  your  boiler  room,  to 
make  any  repairs,  to  purchase  any  apparatus  or  to  do  any¬ 
thing  else  for  the  improvement  of  efficiency  that  will  require 
the  consent  of  the  Manager,  go  to  him  like  a  man  and  state 
your  case  like  one.  Don’t  be  afraid  of  the  Manager.  He  won’t 
bite  you.  If  you  come  to  talk  business  he  will  take  the  time 
to  talk  business  with  you.  If  he  wasn’t  that  kind  of  a  man 
he  wouldn’t  be  Manager.  And  he  wants  an  engineer  who 
knows  what  the  plant  needs  and  who  has  the  intestines  to  ask 
for  it  when  he  wants  it.  Certain  of  the  Power  journals  have 
been  discussing  the  “timidity”  of  the  engineer  and  in  the 
opinion  of  the  editors  the  reason  why  many  steam  plants  fail 
to  progress  is  because  the  Chief  Engineer  is  afraid  of  the 
Manager. 

And  now,  Mr.  Manager,  to  what  extent  are  you  indi¬ 
vidually  blamable  for  the  waste  of  fuel  in  your  boiler  room? 
When  I  use  the  term  “Manager”  I  refer  to  the  executive  who 
is  the  court  of  last  resort  on  every  important  question  relating 
to  the  power  department.  His  official  title  may  be  something 
else.  The  man  I  am  after  is  the  man  highest  up  who  has  any¬ 
thing  to  do  with  the  power  department  and  for  purposes  of 
identification  we  will  call  him  the  “Manager.” 

I  have  talked  with  your  firemen  and  with  your  engineer 
about  the  waste  in  your  boiler  room  and  I  have  obtained 
very  little  satisfaction.  The  waste  will  continue  until  some¬ 
body  starts  something.  My  notion  of  a  “Manager”  is  that 
it  is  part  of  his  business  to  manage.  When  a  reform  is 
called  for,  he  should  either  originate  it  or  see  that  somebody 
else  does  some  originating.  The  waste  in  your  boiler  room 
can  be  stopped  by  an  order,  an  edict,  an  irade  or  whatever  it 
is  that  you  issue  when  you  want  action.  If  your  patience  will 
permit  a  reading  of  this  book  to  a  finish  I  shall  try  to  make 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


37 


good  my  strange  claim  that  fuel  wastes  can  actually  be 
stopped  by  the  flat  of  the  Manager.  If  you  are  in  love  with 
these  wastes  they  will  certainly  continue.  If  you  are  not  in 
love  with  them  but  keep  mum  about  them  they  will  just  as 
certainly  continue. 


Every  morning  your  firemen  are  handed  a  roll  of  money 
in  the  form  of  coal.  You  do  not  even  count  it  when  you  hand 
it  to  them.  You  permit  them  to  spend  it  according  to  their 
own  fancy.  You  require  no  accounting  from  them.  This  is 
better  treatment  than  you  accord  your  wife.  When  Madam 
gets  her  allowance  you  know  to  a  nickel  how  much  you  have 
handed  her.  She  has  to  stretch  it  and  get  along  with  it  or 
get  up  in  the  silent  watches  of  the  night  and  go  through  your 
trousers.  Did  you  ever  put  a  scoop  shovel  in  her  hands  and 
turn  her  loose  on  your  pile  of  bullion? 


38 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


Treat  the  other  departments  of  your  factory  plant  with 
the  same  fine  consideration  that  you  show  your  boiler  room 
and  the  sheriff  will  turn  up  in  a  short  time  with  a  placard 
and  a  tack  hammer. 

Every  business  day  in  the  year  a  clerk  from  your  office  is 
sent  to  the  bank  to  deposit  the  garnerings  of  your  business. 
What  would  you  do  to  that  clerk  if  he  should  lose  as  many 
dollars  each  day  on  his  way  to  the  bank  as  you  know  your 
firemen  waste  each  day  in  burning  your  fuel?  If  he  lost  a 
quarter  oi  a  dollar  a  day  you  would  be  furious  about  it.  And 
yet  you  can  talk  of  the  waste  of  many  dollars  a  day  in  your 
boiler  room  and  be  complacent  about  it.  You  reverse  the 
telescope  when  you  look  at  the  boiler  room  and  this  makes 
everything  down  there  look  very  small  and  very  far  away 
from  you. 

The  money  that  your  careless  clerk  loses  on  the  way  to 
the  bank  is  not  lost  utterly.  Somebody  will  find  it  and  it  may 
be  returned  to  you.  If  not  returned  it  may  serve  to  buy  food 
and  clothing  for  some  suffering  family.  But  the  fuel  that  your 
fireman  wastes  is  lost  forever.  It  is  gone  absolutely  without 
hope  of  recovery.  Needless  fuel  waste  can  be  properly  classi¬ 
fied  as  an  economic  crime,  because  it  reduces  our  national 
resources  and  this  in  its  turn  affects  everybody.  When  we 
apply  that  25  per  cent  factor  ot  needless  fuel  loss  to  the  half 
billion  tons  of  coal  consumed  in  the  United  States  annually, 
we  have  a  conservation  proposition  of  national  importance. 

A  Chicago  fireman  was  caught,  several  years  ago,  selling 
a  few  hods  of  coal  from  the  bunkers  of  the  boiler  room  in 
which  he  was  employed.  The  weather  was  cold  and  the  stoves 
in  the  Ghetto  were  hungry.  His  employer  was  justly  indig¬ 
nant  and  the  fireman  was  sent  to  the  Bridewell.  A  few 
months  later  this  same  employer  was  shown  by  a  firm  of  fuel 
engineers,  how  and  why  his  other  firemen  were  needlessly 
wasting  more  'than  30  per  cent  of  his  fuel.  He  was  “not. 
interested.”  The  loss  itself  concerned  him  less  than  the  man¬ 
ner  of  the  losing. 

It  is  difficult  to  understand  the  average  plant  Manager’s 
point  of  view  as  respects  fuel  economy.  He  regards  his  coal 
bill  as  a  necessary  evil  and  he  considers  preventable  fuel 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted.  39 

waste  as  an  organic  disease,  peculiar  to  the  industry  in  which 
he  is  engaged — a  trouble  that  must  be  endured  because  he 
thinks  it  cannot  be  cured.  And  so  in  many  cases  it  is  impos¬ 
sible  to  interest  him.  He  will  tell  you  that  he  is  not  an 
engineer,  that  he  cannot  hope  to  understand  engineering  prob¬ 
lems  and  that  all  such  matters  are  left  to  his  engineering 
department.  But  if  you  will  go  and  talk  with  the  engineering; 
department  you  will  find  that  he  does  not  leave  such  matters 
in  its  hands.  The  Chief  Engineer  knows  from  experience 
about  what  his  chances  are  when  he  asks  for  money  for  plant 
improvements.  He  must  wait  for  the  psychological  moment 
to  arrive  before  he  makes  his  requisition.  He  must  get  on  the' 
leeward  side  of  the  Manager  and  stalk  him  like  a  hunter 
stalks  a  lion.  If  he  makes  his  approach  at  the  wrong  time  or 
from  the  wrong  direction  his  requisition  will  not  be  honored. 

A  Manager  recently  said  to  me:  “It  will  be  necessary  for 
you  to  discuss  that  subject  with  our  Chief  Engineer.  We 
leave  all  such  matters  to  him.”  “Leaves  all  such  matters  to 
me,  does  he?”  said  the  Chief.  “In  a  pig’s  eye  he  does.  If  he 
only  did  leave  them  to  me  there  would  be  something  doing. 
Last  week  I  went  at  the  office  with  a  requisition  for  a  feed 
water  thermometer.  I  was  turned  down.  The  old  man  said, 
we  must  ‘economize.’  I  told  him  that  was  what  I  wanted  to 
do  and  why  I  wanted  the  thermometer.  I  tried  to  explain 
that  every  ten  degrees  added  to  the  temperature  of  the  feed 


40 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


water  meant  a  saving  of  one  per  cent  in  fuel  and  what  do  you 
think  he  said  to  me?  He  asked  me  if  the  thermometer  would 
make  the  feed  water  any  hotter.  I  told  him  that  I  couldn’t 
heat  water  with  a  thermometer,  but  that  the  thermometer 
would  tell  me  where  in  thunder  I  was  ‘at,’  that  at  present  the 
only  means  I  had  of  judging  the  feed  water  was  by  feeling  the 
pipes.  Did  I  get  that  $4  thermomter?  I  did  not;  and  now  I 
don’t  care  what  the  temperature  of  the  feed  water  is.  I 
wouldn’t  turn  my  hand  if  the  boilers  were  taking  ice  water.” 

Of  course,  the  engineer  took  the  wrong  position  in  the 
matter.  If  he  could  not  get  the  co-operation  of  the  Manager 
in  securing  economy  he  should  have  taken  all  of  the  economy 
he  could  get  without  co-operation.  But  he  took  the  natural 
position  and  one  that  I  find  a  good  sized  percentage  of  the 
engineers  in  steam  power  plants  are  taking. 

If  we  must  condemn  the  attitude  of  the  engineer,  how 
much  more  must  we  condemn  the  attitude  of  the  Manager  in 
that  instance.  When  you  expect  something  for.  nothing  you 
are  sure  to  get  nothing  for  something.  If  you  want  efficiency 
you  must  provide  the  means  of  producing  efficiency.  Pharaoh* 
thought  he  could  get  bricks  without  furnishing  straw  and  he 
fell  down  on  the  proposition.  This  happened  3,405  years  ago, 
according  to  the  chronology  of  Archbishop  Usher,  and  yet  in 
these  late  days  and  these  enlightened  times  there  are  men  who 
believe  that  they  can  put  it  over.  The  children  of  Israel 
did  scratch  around  and  produce  a  certain  amount  of  straw,  but 
■it  was  expensive  straw  for  Pharoah.  And  a  lot  of  engineers 
have  gone  down  into  their  own  socks  for  the  money  with 
which  to  purchase  needed  testing  apparatus.  Go  and  ask  the 
manufacturers  of  steam  engine  “Indicators”  about  it.  They 
will  tell  you  that  the  Indicator  worked  its  way  into  the  power 
plant  through  the  lean  pocketbooks  of  operating  engineers. 
Today  the  Indicator  is  considered  a  prime  necessity  in  power 
plant  practice  and  the  plants  themselves  are  actually  buying 
them.  Go  and  ask  the  manufacturers  of  Flue  Gas  Analyzers 
about  it.  They  will  tell  you  that  a  large  percentage  of  their 
orders  comes  direct  from  the  engineers  of  steam  plants  who 


*An  old  fool  who  resided  in  Egypt  some  years  ago. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


41 


A  TjOT  of  engineers  have  gone  down  into 

THEIR  ON  SOCKS. 

You  remember,  Mr.  Manager,  the  time  that  your  engineer 
came  to  your  office,  cap  in  hand,  and  asked  you  to  buy  some¬ 
thing  that  he  needed  to  improve  the  efficiency  of  the  boiler 
room.  You  turned  him  down  rather  gruffly  and  he  proceeded 
to  “beat  it.”  You  haven’t  seen  him  since  and  he  is  not  likely 
to  bother  you  again.  Nice  encouragement,  that,  for  an  em¬ 
ployee  who  felt  that  he  was  risking  his  job  in  asking  you  to 
spend  a  few  dollars  in  your  own  interests.  I  am  sure  you 
would  have  respected  him  more  had  he  stood  his  ground  like 
a  man  and  demanded  the  thing  that  his  judgment  told  him  he 
needed.  I  am  not  your  employee  and  I  am  not  the  least  bit 
afraid  of  you— hence  I  am  shoving  these  few  facts  right  down 


are  scrimping  to  buy  the  apparatus  and  who  are  paying  for  it 
in  pitiful  monthly  installments. 


42 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


your  throat  into  your  gizzard.  Some  day  the  Directors  of 
your  company  will  ask  to  see  the  coal  bills. 


THAT  AWFUL  MOMENT  WHEN 


'The  iTt-s<nent  of  the  Aourd  asks  the  Managing  Executive  to 
explain  why  the  dividends  are  so  emaciated  and  the  coal  bills 
so  plump. 

I  do  not  mean,  of  course,  that  you  should  buy  every  fool 
thing  that  the  power  department  asks  for  and  that  is  guar¬ 
anteed  to  improve  efficiency.  Murder!  No.  That  would  be 
as  reprehensible  as  your  present  practice  of  buying  nothing. 
You  have  bought  too  much  stuff  in  the  past  that  proved  to  be 
junk  and  that  is  one  thing  that  ails  you.  You  now  class 
everything  that  is  offered  in  the  junk  category.  For  example, 
when  the  smoke  inspector  was  after  you,  you  afflicted  your 
boilers  with  patented  steam  jets  at  a  cost  of  about  $200  apiece. 
You  didn’t  know  that  these  devices  were  condemned  by 
engineering  authorities  nearly  50  years  ago.  And  when  the 
steam  jets  failed,  you  paid  another  man  about  $200  per  boiler 
to  surround  your  fire  boxes  with  air  ducts.  You  didn’t  know 
that  the  air  ducts  were  tried  and  found  guilty  before  steam  jets 
were  invented.  You  didn’t  know  that  more  than  1,700  patents 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


43 


have  issued  from  the  United  States  Patent  Office,  covering 
steam  jets,  air  ducts  and  other  fake  furnace  contrivances,  all 
of  which  violate  the  basic  requirements  of  economical  combus¬ 
tion.  You  have  regarded  combustion  as  a  mystery  and  you 
have  neglected  to  inform  yourself.  Hence  you  have  bitten  at 
the  fakes  and  been  bitten  by  the  fakers.  Hence  you  place  the 
good  things  that  you  ought  to  buy  in  the  same  category  with 
the  bad  things  you  have  purchased.  In  the  later  chapters  of 
this  book  I  shall  try  to  show  you  what  a  marvelously  simple 
thing  it  is  to  secure  economical  combustion.  I  shall  give  you 
the  data  that  will  enable  you  to  choose  among  the  host  of 
things,  good,  bad  and  indifferent,  that  are  offered  for  the  use 
of  your  boiler  room.  And  the  next  time  that  you  are  asked 
by  your  engineer  to  buy  something  for  power  plant  better¬ 
ment,  don’t  dismiss  him,  but  make  him  come  across  and  show 
exactly  how  and  why  the  thing  that  he  wants  is  going  to 
improve  conditions.  If  he  can’t  show  you  and  prove  his 


biv  a  barrel  of  his  boiler  compound  we  will  save  half  of  our 

coal. 

Engineer  Jeff:  Say,  Mutt,  let’s  buy  two  barrels  and  save 
all  of  the  coal. 


44 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


case,  don’t  buy  it.  If  he  does  show  you  and  you  don’t  pur¬ 
chase,  give  him  a  mighty  good  reason  for  your  refusal  and 
ask  him  to  come  again  whenever  he  has  a  suggestion  to  offer. 
Give  your  power  department  the  same  business  treatment 
that  you  give  every  other  department.* 

A  little  knowledge  of  combustion  and  a  little  more  interest 
in  your  power  plant  will  enable  you  to  make  a  discriminating- 
choice  before  you  make  a  purchase.  There  are  many  meri¬ 
torious  specialties  on  the  market.  You  could  and  should  use 
some  of  them  because  they  will  make  it  possible  for  your  men 
to  reduce  your  fuel  bills.  When  the  salesman  calls,  give  him 
a  hearing.  You  may  get  some  valuable  ideas  even  if  you  do 
not  buy.  Don’t  “saw  the  salesman  off’’  on  the  purchasing 
agent.  I  know  you  dislike  salesmen  because  they  take  up 
your  time.  I  dislike  them  myself.  When  I  have  to  sit  and 
listen  to  a  windy  salesman’s  jabber,  my  milk  of  human  kind¬ 
ness  turns  to  hard  and  sour  clabber.  The  salesmen  wait  for 
me  at  night,  they  lay  for  me  at  morn.  I  know  they  will  be  on 
my  trail  when  Gabriel  blows  his  horn.  I  sat  before  my  fire 
one  night  to  take  my  evening  nap.  A  salesman  jimmied  up 
the  sash  and  started  with  his  yap.  Then  when  I’d  got  my 
nightie  on,  my  “Now-I-Lay-Me”  said,  I  found  another  sales¬ 
man  hiding  underneath  my  bed.  I  tried  to  kill  a  salesman 
once;  I  broke  his  head  and  slats;  I  threw  him  on  a  garbage 
pile  to  feed  the  dogs  and  cats.  Next  day  I  had  an  awful 
shock;  my  eyes  popped  from  my  head;  the  salesman  on  the 
garbage  pile  had  risen  from  the  dead.  He  stayed  and  talked 
and  talked  and  stayed  and  used  up  all  my  day.  At  last  I 
bought  his  worthless  junk — there  was  no  other  way.  There  is 
no  joy  in  life  for  me — no  rest  where’er  I  go.  Some  salesman’s 
always  butting  in.  This  world’s  a  vale  of  woe.  And  when 
at  last  I  shuffle  off  and  hike  for  Peter’s  gate,  I’ll  find  some 
salesman  waiting  for  me  there  as  sure  as  fate.  And  if  I  give 
the  scamp  the  slip  and  get  inside  the  wall,  he’ll  steal  St. 
Peter’s  golden  keys  and  catch  me  after  all.  And  when  I  have 
my  ticket  changed  for  Satan’s  hot  domain,  the  gang  will  all 
come  after  me — they’ll  all  be  on  my  train.  And  I’ll  land  those 
salesmen  in  the  pit — I’ll  get  them,  every  pup — and  then  I’ll 


*“Suo  sibi  gladio  hunc  jugulo.”  Terence. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


45 


hire  a  thousand  imps  to  fire  the  furnace  up.  And  when  one 
tries  to  scramble  out,  he’ll  find  me  standing  by,  armed  with  a 
red-hot  pitch-fork  and  I’ll  jab  him  in  the  eye. 

A  short  time  ago  I  called  by  appointment  to  see  the  Man¬ 
ager  of  an  Eastern  factory.  We  were  to  discuss  the  subject 
of  his  fuel  losses  and  how  to  stop  them.  He  broke  the  ap¬ 
pointment  to  go  to  the  golf  links,  but  he  was  kind  enough 
to  leave  a  note  of  apology.  I  shall  not  call  to  see  that  man 
again.  He  can  take  his  25  per  cent  fuel  loss  or  whatever  his 


“Good  night!  Our  coal  con¬ 
sumption  is  going  up  and  our 
factory  output  is  going- 
down.” 


“Now  I  wonder  what  in 
thunder  the  trouble  is?  Guess 
I’ll  go  down  to  the  CLUB.” 


(Pictures  stolen  from  Briggs) 

And  you  diseuss  the  enormously  important  subject  of  Golf 
with  the  other  elub  members. 

The  captain  is  responsible  for  his  ship  and  is  held  ac- 
ountable  for  everything  and  everybody  upon  it.  You  are 


*Expunged  by  the  Censor. 


46 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


the  captain  of  an  industrial  craft  and  you  ought  to  sit  up  and 
take  notice  when  the  men  of  your  command,  heedlessly,  care¬ 
lessly  and  boneheadedly  throw  away  your  stockholders’  money. 
If  you  evince  no  interest  in  fuel  economy  you  can’t  expect 
your  firemen  and  engineers  to  sit  up  nights  and  worry  about 
it.  They  are  not  stockholders  in  your  institution.  Interest 
will  not  originate  in  the  boiler  room.  The  higher  up  that 
interest  starts  the  better.  It  will  go  down  by  force  of  gravity 
and  stir  up  everybody  below  its  point  of  origin.  If  you  main¬ 
tain  your  sphinx-like  attitude  on  the  subject  of  fuel  waste, 
your  plant  will  never  enjoy  the  benefits  of  the  most  econom¬ 
ical  steam  production  because  there  will  not  be  any  such 
benefits  to  enjoy. 

The  whole  problem  of  getting  efficiency  in  a  steam  power 
plant  is  the  problem  of  waking  up  the  “big  boss.” 

And  so,  Mr.  Manager,  when  we  submit  this  question  of 
WHY  YOUR  FUEL  IS  WASTED  to  fractional  distillation  and 
ultimate  analysis,  we  find  that  you  yourself  are  primarily 
responsible  for  all  of  the  trouble.  We  are  forced  to  condemn 
you  without  benefit  of  clergy.  You  are  the  “nigger  in  the 
wood-pile,”  the  “woman  in  the  case,”  the  “casus  belli”  and  the 
“primordial  germ”  of  all  of  the  fuel  wastes  in  your  boiler 
room.  If  you  don’t  take  a  stand  for  economy  we  might  as 
well  throw  up  the  sponge  and  all  the  rest  of  the  groceries.  If 
we  can  get  you  started  and  keep  you  going  we  can  inoculate 
everything  on  two  legs  around  your  factory  with  the  germs  of 
economy  and  the  anti-toxins  of  waste.  We  can  even  make  the 
girls  in  the  office  remember  to  turn  out  the  electric  lights 
when  they  are  not  needed.  We  can  go  to  the  very  limit  in 
everything  that  affects  the  cost  of  heat,  light  and  power.  We 
can’t  do  a  blamed  thing  if  you  won’t  back  us  and  help  us. 
You  are  in  a  position  to  say  that  the  things  which  should  be 
done,  must  be  done.  If  your  engineer  is  incompetent  or 
remiss  in  his  duties,  put  him  on  the  toboggan  slide  and  get 
another  one.  And  the  next  time  that  you  hire  a  chief  engineer 
look  at  his  head  before  you  look  at  his  hands.  If  he  is  short  a 
few  fingers  it  doesn’t  matter,  but  if  he  is  short  in  the  noddle 
you  don’t  want  him.  If  he  doesn’t  know  how  to  stop  fuel 
wastes  you  can’t  afford  him. 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


47 


Don’t  fly  off  the  track,  Mr.  Manager,  and  blow  up  the 
Engineer  or  the  Fireman  because  you  are  burning  too  much 
coal.  “People  who  live  in  glass  houses  should  keep  their 
clothes  on.” 

And  now,  Mr.  Manager,  Mr.  Superintendent,  Mr.  Chief 
Engineer  and  Mr.  Fireman,  I  wish  to  impress  upon  you,  if  I 
can,  that  fuel  waste  is  a  crime  for  which  there  should  be  some 
adequate  punishment.  It  is  a  crime  because  when  you  waste 
fuel  you  are  using  some  of  our  natural  resources  that  belong 
to  future  generations.  And  when  you  waste  it  you  are  putting- 
up  the  price  of  my  fuel.  You  have  no  right  to  do  that  and  I 
cannot  afford  it. 

Fuel  waste  in  the  time  of  the  great  war  was  worse  than 
a  crime;  it  was  treason  because  it  gave  a  great  deal  of  aid 


48  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


y/ 


and  comfort  to  our  German  enemies.  The  Kaiser  would  have 
decorated  you  with  iron  crosses  as  big  as  dish-pans  if  he 
could  have  gotten  them  through  the  Western  lines. 


You  treasonably  wasted  150,000,000  tons  of  coal  in  1917. 
This  was  worth  more  to  the  Kaiser’s  cause  than  a  million 
German  bayonets. 


It  interfered  with  the  manufacture  and  transportation  of 
munitions.  But  for  the  very  prompt  and  effective  action  of 
our  government  through  the  National  Fuel  Administration  it 
might  have  resulted  in  the  triumph  of  German  arms. 

Anarchy  under  the  name  of  “Bolshevism”  is  now  threat¬ 
ening  to  overturn  what  is  left  to  us  of  civilization.  The  cure 
for  “Bolshevism”  is  a  reduction  in  the  cost  of  living.  Stop 
wasting  fuel  and  the  price  of  fuel  will  come  down.  With 


Why  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


49 


falling  fuel  prices  the  cost  of  living  will  come  clown.  These 
propositions  must  be  evident  to  every  thinking  man. 

Ancl  now.  having  blackguarded  everybody  to  my  heart’s 
content,  let  us  get  down  to  the  brass  carpet  tacks  of  the  fur¬ 
nace  efficiency  question.  In  the  next  four  chapters  I  shall  try 
to  hold  up  each  individual  item  of  fuel  waste  and  visualize  it 
so  that  you  can  see  it.  And  for  each  item  of  preventable  waste 
I  shall  offer  a  specific  remedy.  I  want  the  Manager,  the  Chief 
Engineer  and  the  Firemen  to  go  with  me  to  the  boiler  room 
and  stay  with  me  through  those  four  chapters.  I  shall  have 
something  to  say  to  each  of  them.  And  what  I  shall  say  will 
apply  to  your  plant,  no  matter  whether  you  have  hand-fired 
furnaces  or  automatic  stokers — no  matter  whether  you  burn 
coal,  oil,  gas,  sawdust  or  buffalo  chips.  Combustion  is  com¬ 
bustion. 


IT  I  snjt  the  origJnhl  Cost- it's  The  — 


'///////////  ////// 

hello!  This  the  # 

Not  CorlCo"  send 
Two  ToWS'A  CoHU 
WHAT’s’/VT  9  BOCKS 
n  Tow-  Good  b 

T 


To*  InSTUNCF 

A  - 

STOVE 
ON 

PH*. 


Moore* 


The  funny  thing  about  this  cartoon  is  that  “hard  nut”  coal 
is  selling  today  (in  these  glorious  days  of  peace  and  high 
prices)  at  thirteen  and  a  half  bucks  per  ton. 


50  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

CHAPTER  II. 

HOW  YOUR  FUEL  IS  WASTED. 

Waste  is  the  “black  beast”  of  every  manufacturing  busi¬ 
ness.  It  has  more  lives  than  any  cat  that  was  ever  kittened. 
We  can’t  kill  it.  We  can  only  fight  it  and  we  must  be  con¬ 
tinually  on  the  alert  if  we  would  keep  the  brute  out  of  the 
establishment.  Eternal  vigilance  is  the  price  of  economy. 

As  I  tried  to  show  in  the  first  chapter,  fuel  economy  waits 
for  somebody  to  start  something.  After  things  are  started 
economy  demands  a  very  persistent  follow-up  and  a  careful 
attention  to  details.  Fuel  economy  depends  upon  little  things 
and  many  of  them.  I  suppose  the  same  thing  may  be  said 
of  economy  in  any  other  relation.  However  that  may  be,  the 
statement  applies  with  particular  force  to  all  of  the  economies 
that  relate  to  the  production  of  power. 

The  first  step  toward  fuel  economy  must  be  taken  in  the 
field  of  psychology  by  the  association  of  ideas,  rather  than  in 
the  field  of  engineering.  The  Manager  must  change  his  con¬ 
cept  of  the  power  plant.  He  must  get  it  into  the  factory  class 
and  associate  it  with  ideas  of  money  earning.  He  will  then 
apply  to  his  steam  plant  the  same  business  methods  that  he 
uses  in  his  office  and  factory.  And  if  he  does  this  the  pre¬ 
ventable  wastes  will  disappear  and  the  boiler  plant  will  begin 
to  really  earn  real  money. 

Now  let  us  try  the  “association  of  ideas”  and  see  where  it 
leads  us.  Suppose  your  factory  is  losing  instead  of  making 
money.  What  do  you  do  about  it?  You  seek  to  discover  the 
causes  of  the  loss  and  you  lose  no  time  about  it.  Your  cost 
of  production  may  be  too  high,  your  sales  force  may  be 
inefficient  or  you  may  have  been  unwise  in  the  extension  of 
credits,  you  will  go  hunting  for  reasons  and  causes  and  you 
will  keep  on  hunting  until  you  find  them.  As  a  manufacturer 
you  have  two  general  problems  to  consider,  viz.:  How  to 
transform  the  raw  materials  into  the  finished  product  with  the 
least  possible  expense  and  how  to  transfer  the  finished  product 

It  is  a  short  distance,  as  the  crow  flies,  from 
the  manager’s  office  to  the  boiler  room,  but  it 
is  a  dickens  of  a  long  road  by  the  route  that 
the  manager  travels. 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


51 


f i  om  your  factory  to  the  consumer  with  another  least  possible 
expense.  The  faster  the  consumer  uses  it  up  or  wears  it  out 
the  sooner  he  will  be  back  again  for  some  more  of  your 
product.  You  should  worry.  These  same  problems  present 
themselves  when  you  consider  the  manufacture  of  steam  for 
your  own  uses  and  a  third  problem  arises  from  the  fact  that 
you  are  both  producer  and  consumer.  You  want  to  make  the 
steam  go  as  far  as  possible  after  you  have  manufactured  it. 
Accordingly  if  you  think  of  economy  twice  in  connection  with 
your  factory  product,  you  must  think  of  it  three  times  in  con¬ 
nection  with  the  product  of  your  boiler  room. 

Most  manufacturers  regard  the  entire  power  problem  as 
a  thing  of  mystery.  Most  engineers  regard  the  combustion 
problem  as  a  baffling  proposition.  There  is  no  mystery  about 
either  fire  or  water.  We  bring  the  two  together  and  the 
result  is  steam.  There  is  no  more  mystery  about  a  furnace 
and  a  boiler  than  there  is  about  a  stove  and  a  teakettle.  The 
process  in  each  case  is  exactly  similar  to  that  in  the  other. 
It  consists  in  getting  the  heat  out  of  the  fuel  and  into  the 
water.  There  are  accordingly  just  two  general  problems  to 
be  considered  in  the  economical  production  of  steam,  viz.: 

1.  Are  you  actually  using  all  of  the  fuel? 

2.  Are  you  putting  as  much  of  the  generated  heat  as 
possible  into  the  boiler? 

Burn  all  of  the  coal  you  buy  and  use  all  of  the  heat  from 
the  coal  you  burn.  That  is  all  there  is  to  it.  And  after 
you  have  made  the  steam  and  developed  the  power,  don’t 
waste  them.  These  propositions  are  self-evident  and  I  state 
them  more  for  the  purpose  of  outlining  the  discussion  that 
is  to  follow  than  for  your  information. 

You  are  running  a  steam  factory  and  selling  its  product 
to  yourself.  You  are  making  steam  at  a  loss  and  business 
gumption  tells  you  that  it  should  be  made  at  a  profit.  Steam 
and  power  are  commodities  just  as  much  as  soap  or  plows 
or  beer  or  pianos.  You  can  go  into  the  market  and  buy 
your  steam  and  power  from  the  central  station.  The  differ¬ 
ence  between  the  market  price  and  the  cost  of  production  in 
your  own  plant  expresses  the  loss  or  profit  of  your  steam 
factory. 


£  "  ' 


52  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


The  central  station  makes  power  to  sell  and  you  make 
it  to  use.  It  treats  power  as  a  merchantable  commodity  and 
sells  it  at  a  profit.  You  treat  power  as  an  incident  and  you 
produce  it  at  a  loss.  The  central  station  looks  after  the  big 
little  things  that  affect  the  cost  of  power  production  and  you 
permit  your  power  house  to  look  after  itself.  And  I  have 
been  in  central  stations  that  were  wasting  a  quarter  of  their 
fuel.  They  were  able  to  stay  in  business  because  some  of  the 
isolated  plants  around  them  were  wasting  much  more  than  a 
^quarter.  The  engineers  of  isolated  plants  richly  deserve  what 
•they  are  suffering  from  the  competition  of  the  central  station. 

Power,  like  any  other  commodity,  can  be  manufactured 
cheaper  at  wholesale  than  at  retail.  The  central  station  has 
that  economic  advantage  over  the  isolated  power  plant,  but 
against  this  advantage  are  certain  handicaps  which  tip  the 
scales  against  it.  It  costs  the  central  plant  something  to  get 
and  keep  your  business.  It  must  run  transmission  lines  and 
maintain  them.  All  these  items,  which  do  not  afflict  the 
isolated  plant,  must  be  added  to  the  central  station’s  cost  of 
power  and  to  its  total  cost  must  be  added  a  safe  margin  of 
profit.  The  “wholesale”  explanation  does  not  explain  every¬ 
thing.  If  isolated  plants  were  as  economical  in  the  use  of 
fuel  as  they  might  be,  the  central  station  would  find  very 
poor  pasture.  The  central  station  makes  money  because  the 
isolated  plants  waste  money.  Now  before  you  contract  for 
outside  power  let  us  see  what  can  be  done  to  place  your  own 
steam  plant  upon  a  paying  basis. 

The  raw  materials  out  of  which  steam  is  manufactured 
are  fuel,  air  and  water.  Air  costs  nothing  and  in  order  to 
simplify  the  work  before  us  we  will  assume  that  water  costs 
no  more  than  air.  The  cost  of  water  in  the  steam  factory , 
may,  of  course,  be  considerable.  The  only  costs  we  shall 
consider  are  those  directly  and  indirectly  related  to  the  fuel, 
which  wre  will  assume  to  be  coal. 

Let  us  suppose  that  we  buy  a  ton  of  coal  at  the  mine  and 
that  the  heat  value  of  the  fuel  is  14,500  British  thermal  units 
.per  pound.  There  will  accordingly  be  29,000,000  heat  units  in 
our  ton  of  coal.  As  each  heat  unit  represents  778  foot  pounds 
tof  energy  we  find  that  we  have  purchased  considerable  latent 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


dynamics.  If  the  energy  in  a  few  pounds  of  that  coal  should 
be  explosively  released  in  your  boiler  room  there  wouldn’t 
be  enough  left  of  your  factory  plant  to  make  a  grease  spot  on 
the  horizon.  The  process  of  steam  power  production  consists 
in  taking  this  energy  out  of  the  coal  and  making  it  do  useful 
work  in  the  factory.  If  we  could  only  reach  the  switchboard 
with  all  of  the  energy  that  we  buy  at  the  mine  the  power  bill 
would  not  be  a  serious  matter.  The  average  steam  plant 
wastes  98  per  cent  of  the  energy  between  the  mine  and  the 
machine.  If  a  ton  of  coal  costs  $3.00  we  get  our  money's 
worth  on  a  nickel  and  a  fraction  of  a  cent.  We  begin  to  spill 
the  energy  out  of  that  ton  of  coal  as  soon  as  it  is  loaded  into 
the  railroad  car  at  the  mine  and  we  keep  on  spilling  energy 
whenever  we  change  it  from  one  receptacle  to  another  or 
transform  it  from  one  condition  to  another.  More  than  half 
of  the  energy  waste  in  the  average  power  plant  is  preventable, 
so  that  if  all  of  the  losses  could  receive  prompt  attention  we 
should  be  able  to  make  a  half  a  ton  of  coal  do  what  a  whole 
ton  had  been  doing  before. 

The  table  and  diagram,  presented  in  Chapter  I,  show  about  .. 
how  the  losses  take  place  between  the  mine  and  the  machine 
in  your  factory.  They  show  exactly  where  we  must  look  to 
make  the  fuel  savings. 

The  first  spill  of  energy  takes  place  when  the  coal  is 
exposed  to  the  weather.  It  oxidizes  very  slowly.  The  Uni¬ 
versity  of  Illinois  has  conducted  extensive  experiments  to 
determine  the  effect  that  “weathering”  has  upon  coal.  The 
loss  was  found  to  be  most  rapid  during  the  week  or  ten  days 
first  following  exposure  after  mining.  The  waste  thereafter, 
while  very  slow,  continued  indefinitely.  The  loss  is  greater 
with  the  smaller  sizes  of  coal  owing  to  the  fact  that  a  pro¬ 
portionately  greater  surface  is  exposed  to  the  action  of  oxygen 
as  the  lumps  of  coal  decrease  in  size.  The  loss  in  covered  bins: 
was  substantially  the  same  as  in  open  bins.  It  was  least 
when  the  coal  was  stored  under  water.  In  its  bulletin  on  the 
“Weathering  of  Coal”  the  University  says: 

“In  the  coals  that  have  been  tested,  1  per  cent  is  about  tlu> 
average  loss  for  the  first  week  and  3  to  ZVz  per  cent  would 
cover  the  loss  for  a  year,  although  in  some  cases  the  loss  was 
found  to  be  as  high  as  5  per  cent  in  a  year.’’ 


54 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


“It  is  probable  that  the  figures  given  above  are  away  in 
excess  of  what  would  be  expected  in  commercially  stored  coal/ 
It  is  obvious  that  only  those  portions  of  the  coal  pile  that  are 
actually  exposed  to  the  weather  will  be  influenced  by  atmos¬ 
pheric  action.  Chemical  change  is,  however,  likely  to  take 
place  at  the  interior  of  the  coal  pile.  One  of  the  objections 
to  coal  storage  is  the  danger  of  heating  and  spontaneous  com¬ 
bustion.  These  dangers  are  increased  when  the  coal  is  in  a 
finely  divided  condition  and  contains  sulphur  or  pyrites  of  iron. 
When  coal  heats  spontaneously  there  is  a  loss  of  heat  energy 
equal  to  the  actual  heat  generated  and  when  it  ignites  spon¬ 
taneously  the  loss  may  be  total.” 

Unless  there  is  some  good  reason  for  the  storage  of  coal 
in  quantity  it  is  best  to  keep  as  little  of  it  on  hand  as  possible. 
The  storage  place  should,  of  course,  be  located  with  reference 
to  convenience  and  ease  of  transferring  the  fuel  from  the 
hunkers  to  the  furnaces.  My  observation  has  been  that  in 
many  power  plants  a  change  in  the  location  and  arrangement 
of  the  bunkers  would  result  in  a  material  saving  of  money. 
Labor,  like  coal,  represents  money,  and  it  is  often  more  diffi¬ 
cult  to  handle  than  the  inanimate  fuel.  The  big  central  station 
installs  coal  and  ash  handling  machinery  which  cuts  down 
the  cost  of  power  by  reducing  the  cost  of  labor. 

It  is  not  practical  to  store  coal  under  water  and  so  I  have 
set  the  loss  due  to  weathering  in  the  column  of  non-prevent- 
able  wastes.  I  have  placed  this  loss  at  1  per  cent,  or  290,000 
heat  units,  and  we  won’t  cry  about  it  because  there  are 
enough  losses  ahead  of  us  to  weep  over. 

To  get  any  good  from  coal  you  must  put  it  in  the  furnace 
and  burn  it.  How  much  of  your  coal  is  wasted  in  handling? 
A  lot  more  than  you  imagine.  Take  a  walk  through  your 
boiler  room  and  around  your  boiler  house  and  see  for  yourself. 
You  will  find  raw  coal  everywhere.  Feet  and  wheels  have 
ground  it  into  a  powder.  You  will  find  coal  in  the  ash  pile 
that  never  saw  the  inside  of  the  furnace.  If  there  is  coal  in 
front  of  the  boilers  when  the  fires  are  cleaned  some  of  it  will 
get  into  the  ash  and  be  carried  to  the  dump.  Some  of  the  ash 
will  get  into  the  coal  and  with  it  go  into  the  furnace.  The 
result  will  be  clinkers,  which  make  work  and  waste  fuel. 
The  loss  in  handling  is  very  small  as  compared  with  some 
other  losses.  It  is  large  enough  to  be  considered  and  it  can 
he  cured  if  you  will  see  that  better  housekeeping  methods  are 
adopted  in  your  boiler  room.  I  have  placed  the  loss  in  han¬ 
dling  at  1  per  cent  of  the  fuel.  It  is  less  than  that  in  some 


Hoiv  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


55 


plants  and  much  more  in  some  others.  The  reader  will 
remember  that  in  all  of  the  figures  presented  in  this  book  the 
conditions  that  obtain  in  average  power  plants,  big  and  little, 
are  being  considered. 

Now,  how  will  you  induce  your  men  to  be  more  careful  in 
the  handling  of  your  fuel?  By  impressing  the  fact  upon  them 
that  a  lump  of  coal  represents  money.  The  fireman,  as  I  have 
already  told  you,  does  not  think  of  coal  in  terms  of  money. 


I  was  walking  through  the  boiler  room  of  a  power  plant 
not  long  ago  in  company  with  the  Manager.  We  stopped  to 
watch  a  fireman  who  was  loading  up  a  wheel-barrow  with 
clinkers  and  ashes.  *  When  the  man’s  back  was  turned  I 
dropped  a  nickel  at  his  feet  and  then  called  his  attention  to 
the  coin,  with  the  remark  that  somebody  was  very  careless 
with  money.  He  lost  no  time  in  putting  that  nickel  in  his 
pocket.  Visions  of  a  foaming  tin  bucket  rose  before  him.  I 
said  to  him:  “Man,  there  must  be  something  wrong  with 
your  eyesight.  I  saw  another  nickel  go  into  that  wheel¬ 
barrow  with  the  ashes.”  He  dumped  that  barrow  of  ashes 
on  the  floor  and  pawed  all  through  it.  He  didn’t  find  the 


56 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


money.  I  said:  “Bring  me  a  pail  of  water  and  I  will  show 
you  how  to  find  money  in  ashes.”  If  there  is  anything  that 
will  make  coal  and  coke  stand  up  in  a  pile  of  ashes  it  is  a 
douche  of  water.  I  drenched  the  ash-pile  and  then  picked  it 
over.  I  got  a  respectable  looking  pile  of  coke  and  coal  from 
the  ashes.  It  was  unnecessary  to  explain  to  the  fireman 
what  I  meant  by  money  in  the  ashes,  or  to  explain  to  him 
that  the  money  he  was  throwing  away  belonged  to  the  Man¬ 
ager  of  the  plant  who  stood  beside  me.  The  next  time  it 
rains  take  your  firemen  to  the  ash  dump  and  give  them  an 
object  lesson. 

You  are  not  burning  the  coke  that  goes  through  your 
grates  with  the  ash  and  you  are  not  burning  the  combustble 
gases  that  go  up  your  chimney  with  the  smoke.  When  you 
have  looked  around  the  boiler  room  and  the  boiler  house, 
when  you  have  looked  at  the  ash-pile  and  the  chimney,  you 
will  have  some  idea  of  the  fuel  that  is  being  wasted  without 
being  burned. 

We  must  expect  to  find  some  coke  in  the  ash  and  you 
need  not  be  frightened  if  you  see  some  smoke  coming  from 
the  chimney.  Smoke  means  waste,  as  we  shall  see  later  on, 
but  not  in  the  way  that  is  popularly  supposed.  The  soot  of 
the  smoke  cannot  in  the  very  worst  circumstances  exceed  2  per 
cent  of  the  carbon  in  the  fuel.  There  may  be  a  great  deal  of 
smoke  going  up  the  chimney  and  very  little  combustible,  or 
there  may  be  a  great  deal  of  combustible  and  very  little  smoke. 
There  may  be  combustible  gas  and  considerable  of  it  in  the 
entire  absence  of  smoke.  These  things  will  have  consideration 
in  a  later  chapter. 

You  must  expect  to  find  some  coke  in  the  ash.  It  is  im¬ 
possible  to  burn  coal  for  power  purposes  and  avoid  all  waste 
through  the  grates.  It  is  possible  to  keep  the  loss  down  to  a 
minimum.  In  order  to  know  what  the  waste  really  amounts  to 
you  must  first  know  how  much  ash  the  coal  itself  contains. 
If  you  have  been  having  your  coal  analyzed  you  will  know 
how  much  ash  the  raw  fuel  carries.  In  the  absence  of  a 
laboratory  report  you  will  be  able  to  get  quite  accurate  data 
in  the  following  manner:  Weigh  all  of  the  coal  burned  dur- 
in  a  day’s  run  and  all  of  the  ash  and  clinker  resulting.  These 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


57 


v.' eights  should  be  taken  every  day,  but  that  is  not  the  prac¬ 
tice  in  the  average  power  plant.  Take  a  couple  of  scoops 
of  ashes  from  each  barrow  load  as  it  is  removed.  Douse 
these  ashes  with  water  and  have  them  carefully  picked  over. 
On  weighing  the  coke  and  ash  proper  you  will  have  the  data 
from  which  the  actual  “ash  waste”  can  be  closely  computed. 
If  the  loss  does  not  exceed  1  per  cent  of  the  combustible  of 
the  coal,  you  are  doing  well.  If  you  are  wasting  four  or  five 
per  cent,  as  is  likely  to  be  the  case,  your  firemen  must  mend 
their  ways. 

Much  of  the  waste  detected  in  the  ash  pit  of  the  boiler 
furnace  is  due  to  the  improper  use  of  fire  tools.  The  slice 
bar  is  abused  almost  every  time  that  it  is  used.  Watch  your 
fireman  when  he  uses  it.  He  will  run  it  along  the  grates 
under  the  fuel  and  then  employ  it  as  a  pry  to  tear  the  fuel  to 
pieces.  This  mixes  ash  with  incandescent  carbon.  The  ash 
fuses  and  clinkers  result.  The  purpose  of  the  slice  bar  is  to 
cut  or  “slice”  the  fuel  away  from  the  grates  and  to  cause  the 
fine  ash  to  fall  through  the  grates.  Under  no  circumstances 
use  it  unless  the  condition  of  the  fire  calls  for  it.  The  fireman 
can  tell  from  the  dark  spots  in  the  ash  pit  when  and  where 
the  fire  needs  slicing. 

Why  do  you  burn  coal  under  a  boiler?  To  make  steam, 
of  course,  by  passing  the  heat  from  the  furnace  through  the 
metal  work  of  the  boiler  where  it  can  get  action  on  the  water. 
Now,  suppose  that  you  cool  down  the  hot  gases  before  they 
reach  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler,  or  that  you  cool 
them  by  outside  influences  while  they  are  in  contact  with  the 
heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler,  or  that  you  hinder  the  heat  in 
some  way  from  passing  through  the  metal  to  the  water,  or 
that  you  permit  some  of  the  heat  to  escape  before  it  has  a 
chance  at  the  boiler — you  will  lose  just  that  much  heat,  won’t 
you?  And  you  will  have  to  burn  just  that  much  more  coal  to 
replace  the  heat  that  has  been  lost. 

Burn  as  much  of  the  fuel  as  possible — i.  e.,  waste  as  little 
as  possible  on  the  floor,  in  the  ash  and  in  the  chimney. 

Use  as  much  as  possible  of  the  heat  resulting  from  the 
fuel  that  you  actually  burn. 

Do  these  two  things  and  you  will  get  all  of  the  steam 


58 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


that  it  is  possible  to  make  with  the  furnace  and  boiler  equip¬ 
ment  that  you  have. 

You  probably  lose  about  5  per  cent  of  the  heat  generated 
in  the  furnace  through  radiation  from  the  furnace  and  the 
boiler  setting.  You  could  stop  four-fifths  of  this  loss  by 
proper  insulation.  One  or  two  inches  of  asbestos  plaster, 
covered  with  canvas  and  the  canvas  covered  with  paint, 
will  make  a  serviceable  overcoat  for  a  boiler  setting. 

This  overcoat  will  serve  the  double  purpose  of  keeping 
the  heat  in  and  the  “cold  out.”  You  apply  weather  strips, 
storm  sash  and  storm  doors  to  your  houses.  Use  the  same 
degree  of  common  sense  with  your  boilers.  The  radiation 
loss  is  a  small  circumstance  compared  with  that  due  to  excess 
air  and  the  overcoat  will  reduce  the  excess  air.  By  “excess 
air”  I  mean  the  air  that  is  taken  into  the  boiler  furnace  or 
into  the  passes  of  the  boiler  in  addition  to  that  actually  used 
in  the  processes  of  combustion.  Suppose  we  take  100  cubic 
feet  of  air  into  the  boiler  furnace  and  use  all  of  the  oxygen 
in  that  air  to  produce  combustion,  and  suppose  that  we 
actually  produce  complete  combustion  under  such  circum¬ 
stances.  The  furnace  would  be  operating  under  ideal  condi¬ 
tions  and  with  the  theoretical  air  supply.  The  furnace 
temperature  would  be  extremely  high — close  to  4,500  degrees 
Fahrenheit.  Nobody  has  ever  seen  such  conditions  in  a  coal 
burning  furnace.  I  am  only  supposing  them.  In  burning  a 
solid  fuel  it  is  quite  impossible  to  maintain  uniform  conditions 
throughout  the  fuel  bed.  The  coal  will  be  a  shade  thinner  in 
some  places  than  in  others.  Little  cracks  and  fissures  will 
form  in  the  fuel  as  it  settles  on  the  grates.  These  thin  places 
and  cracks  oppose  less  resistance  to  the  passage  of  air  than 
the  other  portions  of  the  fuel  bed  and  they  get  more  than 
their  share  of  it.  Hence  it  follows  that  in  burning  coal  or  any 
solid  fuel  we  are  forced  to  entertain  some  excess  air  in  the 
furnace.  If  we  cut  out  this  excess  some  portions  of  the  fuel 
bed  will  not  get  enough  air  and  the  result  will  be  incomplete 
combustion.  The  gas  CO*  will  be  formed  and  flow  up  the 
chimney.  CO  is  the  principal  constituent  of  the  illuminating 
gas  which  is  piped  to  your  residence  at  $1.00  per  thousand 


*CO  is  the  “enemy  alien”  of  combustion. 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


59 


cubic  feet  by  the  gas  company.  You  can’t  afford  to  send  a 
valuable  gas  like  that  up  the  chimney. 

You  can  get  complete  combustion  of  coal  in  the  boiler 
furnace  and  not  use  more  than  40  per  cent  excess  air.  If  the 
coal  runs  high  in  ash  it  will  be  necessary  to  use  more  air, 
and  if  you  are  burning  oil  or  gas  under  your  boilers  you  can 
reduce  the  40  per  cent  excess.  In  the  next  chapter  I  shall 
tell  you  how  you  may  determine  the  exact  percentage  of  air 
excess  as  well  as  the  exact  percentage  of  combustible  CO. 

A  brick  is  a  porous  thing.  Thow  a  dry  one  into  a  pail  of 
water  and  watch  the  bubbles  as  the  water  enters  the  pores  of 
the  brick  and  drives  out  the  air.  Weigh  the  brick  before  it 
goes  in  and  after  it  comes  out  of  the  water.  Now,  remember 
that  there  is  a  partial  vacuum  on  the  inside  of  your  boiler 
setting  when  the  furnace  is  in  operation,  and  atmospheric 
pressure  on  the  outside  of  it.  Every  pore  in  every  brick  is 
busy  trying  to  satisfy  that  vacuum.  More  cold  air  will  flow 
right  through  those  bricks  in  your  boiler  setting  than  you 
imagine.  If  you  will  glue  an  air-tight  box  to  your  boiler 
setting  and  connect  a  sensitive  differential  draft  gage,  such 
as  is  shown  on  another  page  of  this  book,  with  a  tube  running 
into  the  box,  you  will  find  that  the  suction  of  the  chimney  is 
communicated  through  the  pores  of  the  brick  and  that  this 
will  be  indicated  by  the  movement  of  the  liquid  in  the  draft 
gage. 

The  40  per  cent  excess  air  that  you  are  forced  to  enter¬ 
tain  reduces  the  furnace  temperature  about  1,500  degrees 
Fahrenheit.  You  want  no  more  of  that  sort  of  reduction  than 
you  are  forced  to  stand.  Hence  you  want  to  stop  the  infliltra- 
tion  of  air  through  the  brick  work.  The  overcoat  will  stop  it. 
If  it  is  not  the  season  for  “overcoats’*  in  your  power  plant 
you  can  stop  the  air  seepage  by  “sizing’’  or  painting  the 
brickwork.  The  paint  will  make  the  boiler  house  look  more 
home-like  to  the  fireman  and  you  will  get  a  dividend  on  your 
paint  investment  every  time  the  fireman  throws  in  a  shovel 
of  coal. 

The  cold  air  loss  due  to  infiltration  through  the  .brick 
compares  with  the  other  cold  air  losses  your  plant  is  suffering 
as  a  sneeze  compares  to  a  Panhandle  Norther.  We  are  right 


60 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


on  the  track  now  of  some  of  the  old  “he”  losses  that  are 
making  a  joke  of  economy  in  your  boiler  room. 

The  chimney  is  constantly  pumping  air  and  gas  from  your 
furnace  and  boiler.  The  partial  vacuum  created  will  cause 
air  to  flow  into  the  furnace  and  the  gas  passes  of  the  boiler 
wherever  and  whenever  it  can  get  in.  Now  if  there  is  a 
crack  in  the  brickwork  that  looks  suspicious,  try  that  crack 
with  a  candle  flame.  If  there  is  an  inward  draft  of  air  the 
candle  flame  will  indicate  it.  A  tallow  candle  or  a  kerosene 
torch  is  one  of  the  most  important  pieces  of  testing  apparatus 
that  you  can  have  in  your  boiler  room.  Whatever  else  you 
neglect  to  get,  don’t  neglect  the  torch  or  candle. 

In  the  table  of  losses  preceding  I  have  fixed  that  due  to  air 
leaks  in  the  furnace  and  boiler  setting  at  10  per  cent  of  the 
heat  generated  in  the  furnace  and  this  is  a  conservative  esti¬ 
mate  for  the  average  power  plant.  I  have  seen  savings  of  20 
per  cent  made  by  stopping  up  the  rat-holes  in  the  settings  of 
water  tube  boilers.  I  have  known  a  plant  to  go  from  three 
boilers  to  two  after  the  leaks  were  stopped.  And  I  have  the 
very  dickens  of  a  time  making  some  engineers  believe  that  the 
leaks  in  their  boiler  settings  really  amount  to  something.  I 
have  to  take  a  gas  analyzer  and  prove  it  to  them  by  actually 
measuring  the  volume  of  air  that  is  flowing  through  the 
cracks  as  compared  with  the  volume  that  is  used  to  burn  the 
coal.  They  seem  to  think  that  you  can  make  steam  with 
cold  air. 

Engineers  often  say  to  me,  “What’s  the  use  of  plastering 
up  cracks  in  the  brickwork?  They  will  not  stay  plastered. 
The  stuff  will  shrink  when  it  dries  and  fall  out.”  Of  course 
it  will.  Therefore,  don’t  “plaster”  the  cracks.  Calk  them 
with  something  that  will  not  fall  out.  Make  a  very  thin  mix¬ 
ture  of  fire  clay  and  stir  cotton  waste  into  it,  first  pulling 
the  waste  apart  so  that  every  fibre  of  it  will  be  covered  with 
the  clay.  The  waste  being  dry,  will  pick  up  a  lot  of  the  clay. 
Next  sharpen  a  piece  of  board  for  a  calking  tool  and  with  it 
drive  the  clay-coated  waste  into  the  crack.  Fill  the  crack 
full  and  drive  the  stuff  in  tight.  It  will  stay  there  until  the 
setting  falls  down  and  the  cows  come  home.  This  can  be 
done  while  the  boiler  is  in  operation  so  that  you  can  begin  to 


Hoiv  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


61 


get  financial  returns  on  your  clay  and  cotton  investment 
without  waiting  for  the  boiler  to  be  shut  down.  Two  or 
three  hours’  work  and  a  dollar’s  worth  of  material  will  stop 
a  lot  of  cracks.  There  are  cements  and  other  materials  on 
the  market  made  especially  for  the  purpose  of  permanently 
sealing  up  a  brick  boiler  setting.  They  are  somewhat  superior 
to  the  paint  and  the  fire-clay  that  I  have  here  recommended. 

You  must  not  assume  that  any  crack  you  may  find  any¬ 
where  about  the  boiler  setting  is  not  conducting  air  to  the 
heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler.  You  don’t  know  where  that 
crack  leads  to  and  the  only  safe  thing  is  to  try  the  candle 
llame  on  it.  And  remember  that  a  crevice  between  an  “I” 
beam  or  a  stay  and  the  brickwork  may  lead  to  some  hidden 
avenue  that  will  carry  cold  air  where  it  will  do  a  lot  of  dam¬ 
age.  And  don’t  forget  to  inspect  the  brickwork  on  top  of  the 
boiler.  Don’t  make  a  casual  inspection.  Be  thorough.  I 
found  air  leaks  on  one  occasion,  aggregating  one  and  a  half 
square  feet,  at  the  rear  of  a  marine  boiler  of  the  “B.  and  W.” 
type  when  the  engineers  of  the  ship  were  willing  to  make 
oath  that  everything  was  air  tight.  On  another  occasion  I 
won  the  cigars  by  finding  more  than  20  sizable  air  leaks  in 
the  brickwork  of  a  “B.  and  W.”  boiler  in  a  stationary  plant. 
The  engineer  had  just  finished  calking  the  brickwork  of  that 
boiler  and  he  thought  it  was  air  tight.  I  had  had  more 
experience  in  the  air  leak  business  than  that  engineer  and  I 
knew  where  to  look  for  trouble. 

You  are  not  through  looking  for  air  leaks  when  you  have 
finished  inspecting  the  brickwork  of  the  boiler  setting.  In¬ 
spect  the  “metal  work.”  I  assume  that  in  going  over  the 
brick  work  you  will  have  seen  to  the  clean-out  doors,  the 
blow-off  pipe,  etc.  This  is  not  the  “metal  work”  that  I  refer 
to.  You  are  not  through  with  the  work  of  inspection  until 
you  have  tried  the  candle  at  the  boiler  headers.  A  boiler  of 
the  “B.  and  W.”  type  is  an  admirable  steam  generator  and  it 
passes  my  understanding  why  the  manufacturers  have  not 
devised  some  practical  means  of  preventing  air  from  flowing 
in  around  the  front  headers  into  the  first  pass  of  the  boiler. 
The  boiler  doors  are  supposed  to  keep  cold  air  away  from  the 
headers,  but  in  most  cases  they  don’t  do  it.  Show  me  a  “B. 


62 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


and  W.”  boiler  and  I  will  bet  five  to  one  that  I  can  find  some 
place  about  the  boiler  doors  where  the  draft  will  suck  out 
the  flame  of  a  candle.  An  inflow  of  cold  air  around  those 
boiler  doors  is  not  only  bad  for  efficiency,  it  is  bad  for  the 
boiler  headers.  Those  headers  were  properly  packed,  I  sup¬ 
pose,  when  the  boiler  was  originally  installed.  The  trouble 
is  that  the  packing  has  fallen  out  and  nobody  has  thought 
worth  while  to  replace  it.  When  the  engineer’s  atten¬ 
tion  is  called  to  the  situation  at  the  boiler  front  he  is 
surprised.  He  had  supposed  that  the  packing  was  in  proper 
condition  and  that  the  doors  were  tight.  It  is  bad  practice 
to  “suppose”  anything  about  a  steam  boiler.  The  trouble 
with  the  boiler  door  is  that  it  will  warp,  that  the  catches  will 
not  draw  it  into  proper  position,  that  one  or  more  of  the 
catches  may  be  broken,  or  that  some  careless  somebody  will 
neglect  to  see  that  the  door  is  really  closed  in  the  way  that 
the  builders  intended.  In  one  case  that  came  under  my  obser¬ 
vation  an  actual  fuel  saving  of  20  per  cent  was  effected  by 
packing  the  front  headers  of  a  battery  of  “B.  and  W.”  boilers. 
In  that  instance  over  200  per  cent  excess  air  was  flowing 
around  the  boiler  headers  into  the  first  pass. 

Excess  air  is  the  greatest  of  all  causes  of  fuel  loss.  The 
tax  exacted  by  it  exceeds  the  sum  of  all  the  other' taxes  com¬ 
bined  that  are  levied  by  the  wasteful  furnace  upon  the  suf¬ 
fering  coal  pile.  I  took  the  trouble  to  examine  the  logs  of 
all  of  the  tests  made  by  the  United  States  Geological  Survey 
at  its  exposition  testing  plant  in  St.  Louis.  The  excess  air 
losses  as  shown  by  those  tests  were  ten  times  the  losses  due 
to  incomplete  combustion.  If  you  want  to  make  a  home-run 
for  efficiency  begin  on  excess  air. 

I  absolved  your  fireman  in  the  last  chapter  and  I  absolve 
him  again.  He  is  not  responsible  for  the  physical  condition  of 
your  boiler  plant.  He  takes  the  boilers  as  he  finds  them  in 
the  morning  and  he  fires  as  he  sees  fit  during  the  day.  He 
hasn’t  time  to  calk  air  leaks  and  he  isn’t  hired  for  that 
purpose.  You  can’t  make  steam  with  a  sieve.  If  you  will 
take  a  candle  and  go  over  your  boiler  setting  you  will  find 
that  you  are  trying  to  do  so.  You  could  go  all  over  a  boiler 
setting  in  the  time  that  it  has  taken  to  read  this  Jeremiad  on 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


63 


air  leaks.  After  you  stop  the  leaks  you  will  find  that  the 
boiler  steams  more  easily  and  that  there  is  more  draft.  Cold 
air  kills  draft.  You  may  now  have  to  check  the  dampers  to 
keep  the  safety  valves  from  blowing. 

An  Eastern  factory  had  great  difficulty  in  getting  enough 
steam  from  its  three  return  tubular  boilers.  They  were 
actually  contemplating  the  installation  of  a  fourth  boiler. 
The  engineer  bought  five  cents’  worth  of  tallow  candles  and 
went  after  the  air  leaks.  When  the  cracks  were  calked  there 
was  plenty  of  steam.  Now  most  men  would  have  stopped  at 
this  point  because  most  men  are  satisfied  when  there  is 
enough  steam  for  the  factory.  They  look  upon  the  boiler 
plant  as  just  something  to  make  steam,  not  as  something  that 
should  be  made  to  earn  a  profit  like  the  factory  proper.  This 
engineer  had  been  inoculated  with  the  efficiency  germ  and  he 
wasn’t  satisfied.  Efficiency  is  the  most  appetizing  thing. 
When  you  get  a  taste  of  the  real  article  you  can’t  get  enough 
of  it.  In  March,  1911,  the  plant  in  question  was  burning 
coal  at  the  rate  of  2,300  tons  per  annum.  It  is  now  burning- 
coal  at  the  rate  of  1,000  tons  per  annum  and  turning  out  as 
much  product  as  in  1911.  This  is  a  reduction  of  56  per  cent 
and  if  you  don’t  believe  the  story  you  don’t  have  to.*  The 
improvement  was  due  to  the  efficiency  germ  that  got  into  the 
engineer’s  system. 

WThen  the  engineer  had  stopped  up  all  the  air  leaks  he 
could  find  he  said  to  himself,  “Are  there  any  other  places 
where  cold  air  can  get  in  to  cool  off  the  hot  furnace  gases?’’ 
This  question  led  to  the  following  conclusion: 

When  the  furnace  doors  are  open  cold  air  will  rush  in 
and  cool  off  things.  This  is  bad  for  the  coal  account  and  it 
is  bad  for  the  boiler,  as  the  cooling  off  and  heating  up  mean 
expansion  and  contraction,  which  in  turn  lead  to  leaks. 
Therefore,  it  is  essential  that  the  furnace  doors  should  be 
open  for  the  shortest  periods  possible.  To  this  end  the  fire¬ 
men  must  have  the  coal  where  they  can  reach  it  quickly  and 
the  doors  must  be  fixed  so  that  they  can  be  opened  and  closed 
in  the  shortest  possible  time,  and  with  the  least  possible 
effort.  The  firemen  must  understand  that  “time  is  the  essence 


♦Name  and  address  will  be  supplied,  if  desired. 


64 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


of  things”  when  the  furnace  doors  are  open. 

These  conclusions  led  to  certain  minor  re-arrangements 
and  the  firemen  were  speeded  up  to  an  appreciable  degree. 
The  engineer  then  remembered  having  read  in  a  book  some¬ 
where  that  a  coal  burning  furnace  can  be  most  economically 
operated  with  about  40  per  cent  excess  air — that  anything  in 
excess  of  40  per  cent  leads  to  needless  waste  through  a  need¬ 
less  chilling  of  the  gases.  His  line  of  reasoning  led  him  to  a 
further  conclusion,  viz. — that  cold  air  could  get  into  the  fur¬ 
nace  through  a  hole  in  the  fuel  bed,  also  that  there  must  be 
some  relation  between  the  draft  over  the  grates  and  the 
resistance  of  the  fuel  on  the  grates.  In  other  words,  too 
strong  a  draft  and  too  thin  a  fuel  bed  will  lead  to  excess  air 
and  the  excess  taken  in  this  manner  is  just  as  damaging  to 
efficiency  as  an  excess  taken  in  any  other  manner. 

He  now  saw  that  an  apparatus  for  measuring  the  excess 
air  carried  by  the  chimney  gases  would  be  essential  before  he 
could  go  further  with  his  investigations.  Without  such  ap¬ 
paratus  he  would  never  know  how  near  or  how  far  he  might 
be  from  that  dead  line  of  40  per  cent  excess.  Moreover,  he 
could  never  expect  to  standardize  the  firing  practice  in  his 
boiler  room  without  gages  to  measure  the  drafts  over  the 
fire  and  an  apparatus  to  measure  the  excess  air. 

On  inquiry  he  learned  that  the  very  apparatus  he  required 
had  been  on  the  market  and  in  use  in  power  plants  for  many 
years,  moreover,  that  he  could  take  his  choice  among  several 
different  styles  of  such  apparatus  and  largely  suit  himself  in 
the  matter  of  price.  He  accordingly  purchased  a  draft  gage 
for  each  boiler  furnace  and  one  flue  gas  analyzer. 

While  waiting  for  this  apparatus  to  arrive  the  engineer 
became  curious  about  the  heating  surfaces  of  his  boilers. 
On  the  Sunday  following  his  first  investigations  one  of  the 
boilers  was  shut  down  and  he  made  an  examination  of  that 
boiler.  It  had  been  customary  theretofore  to  just  wash  the 
boilers  out  when  they  were  down  and  to  rely  upon  the  saving 
offices  of  some  physicking  boiler  compound.  There  was  a 
whitish  incrustation  on  the  boiler  tubes  and  a  cleaning  tool 
was  obtained  on  the  gamble  that  the  innocent  appearing  white 
stuff  might  not  be  as  innocent  as  it  looked.  It  is  sometimes 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


65 


impossible  to  tell  by  looking  at  a  boiler  tube  whether  the 
scale  is  as  thick  as  an  egg  shell  or  as  thick  as  a  pancake. 
When  the  cleaning  tool  was  through  with  the  guts  of  those 
boilers  it  had  jarred  loose  about  a  wagon  load  of  scale  and 
the  engineer  ceased  to  wonder  why  his  boiler  efficiency  had 
been  suffering  with  the  belly-ache. 

The  heating  surfaces  of  boilers  are  made  as  thin  as  safety 
will  permit,  because  the  thinner  the  metal  the  more  rapidly 
the  heat  will  be  transmitted  to  the  water.  Now  the  con¬ 
ductivity  of  steel  is  about  five  times  that  of  lime  scale,  so 
that  a  tube  with  a  quarter  of  an  inch  of  scale  upon  it  will 
give  heat  to  the  water  no  faster  than  a  steel  tube  an  inch 
and  a  quarter  thick.  Boiler  tubes  are  about  an  eighth  of  an 
inch  thick,  so  that  one-fortieth  of  an  inch  of  scale  lessens  the 
factor  of  conductivity  to  the  same  extent  that  it  would  be 
reduced  by  doubling  the  thickness  of  the  tube.  Any  quantity 
of  scale  is  bad  for  economy. 

The  cleaning  tool  also  dislodged  quite  a  lot  of  carbon¬ 
aceous  scale  from  the  fire  side  of  the  tubes  so  that  after  the 
cleaning  was  finished  both  the  gases  and  the  water  were  in 
contact  with  the  clean  metal.  The  effect  was  extremely 
pronounced.  It  had  been  formerly  difficult  to  get  sufficient 
steam.  The  stopping  of  the  air  leaks  had  helped  amazingly. 
The  cleaning  of  the  heating  surfaces  gave  such  an  impulse 
to  the  boilers  that  there  was  now  too  much  steam  and  one 
of  the  boilers  was  laid  out  of  service. 

It  is  quite  superfluous  to  say  that  the  boilers  in  that  plant 
are  now  cleaned  of  soot  and  scale  accumulations  so  frequently 
that  the  heating  surfaces  are  kept  in  proper  condition  to 
perform  their  functions  all  of  the  time. 

I  cannot  pass  this  subject  without  a  word  of  solemn  warn¬ 
ing  about  the  injudicious  use  of  boiler  compounds.*  In  most 
cases  they  do  more  harm  than  good  and  in  some  cases  they 
have  been  the  originating  causes  of  destructive  boiler  explo¬ 
sions.  Your  engineer  is  liable  to  fix  up  some  home-made 
preparation  and  put  it  in  his  boilers  if  he  is  not  cautioned. 
I  have  actually  known  muriatic  acid  to  be  used.  In  the  back 

*The  term  “Boiler  Compound”  as  here  used  is  not  intended 
to  include  the  various  preparations  on  the  warket  for  treating 
the  metal  work  of  the  boiler  to  prevent  the  adherence  of  scale. 


66 


How  to  Bxtild  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


woods  districts  engineers  still  put  stable  manure  in  the  boiler 
on  the  presumption,  I  suppose,  that  it  will  be  sure  to  increase 
the  horse  power.  Don’t  buy  a  stock  boiler  compound  under 
any  circumstances.  It  may  prove  to  be  the  very  thing  you 
should  not  use.  Never  use  any  compound  until  the  water 
you  are  usiug  has  been  analyzed  and  a  compound  especially 
prepared  for  that  water.  Whatever  compound  you  do  use, 
inspect  the  tubes  whenever  the  boiler  is  down  and  clean  them 
whenever  necessary. 

AVhen  the  gas  analyzer  and  draft  gages  arrived  a  further 
surprise  was  sprung  upon  the  coal  account.  It  was  found 
that  instead  of  an  air  excess  of  40  per  cent  the  furnaces  were 
taking  over  300  per  cent.  The  cooling  effect  of  that  much 
air  offset  the  heat  derived  from  about  one-quarter  of  the  coal 
burned.  It  did  not  take  long  to  find  the  reason  for  this 
excess  air.  The  fires  were  too  thin  on  the  grates  and  the 
firemen  were  not  careful  to  distribute  the  coal  evenly  over 
the  grates.  Thin  spots  and  holes,  through  which  excess  air 
was  pulled  by  the  draft  of  the  chimney,  were  the  result. 
After  a  little  experimenting  the  proper  thickness  of  the  fires 
was  determined  and  marks  were  placed  upon  the  liners  of  the 
fire  doors  to  guide  the  firemen.  The  effect  of  anything  that 
was  done  to  increase  or  decrease  the  air  excess  could  be 
determined  with  the  gas  analyzer  in  less  than  a  minute.  This 
made  it  possible  for  the  engineer  to  give  the  firemen  some 
object  lessons.  He  showed  them  the  effect  of  every  little 
crack  and  rat-hole  in  the  fuel  bed.  He  was  even  able  to 
measure  the  exact  volume  of  air  flowing  through  a  given 
hole  in  the  fire  and  to  tell  the  firemen  in  terms  of  coal  how 
much  saving  the  closing  of  that  hole  represented. 

The  two  boilers  now  made  more  steam  than  the  plant 
could  use,  whereas  the  factory  had  been  limping  with  three 
boilers  before  the  engineer  got  busy  with  his  tallow  candles. 

The  second  boiler  was  then  cut  out  of  service,  but  the  load 
proved  too  much  for  one  lonesome  boiler.  The  grate  surfaces 
were  then  reduced  by  shortening  and  narrowing  the  grates 
under  the  two  boilers.  The  engineer  went  as  far  as  he 
thought  it  was  safe  to  go  in  reducing  grate  areas  and  still 
there  was  too  much  steam.  He  then  reduced  the  rate  of  fuel 


Hoiv  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


67 


consumption  by  reducing  the  draft.  He  placed  a  draft  gage 
on  each  boiler  furnace  and  equalized  the  draft  by  adjusting 
the  individual  boiler  dampers.  In  this  way  the  two  boilers 
were  made  to  work  under  the  same  draft  conditions  and  the 
combustion  relations  were  reduced  to  a  common  denominator. 
The  fireman  could  now  treat  the  two  furnaces  exactly  alike. 
What  applied  to  the  one  applied  to  the  other.  There  were 
the  draft  gages  to  show  him  when  he  had  exactly  the  right 
draft  and  there  were  the  marks  on  the  door  liners  to  show 
him  when  the  fuel  was  of  just  the  right  thickness  on  the 
grates.  The  fireman  could  now  be  reasonably  certain  at  all 
times  that  the  air  excess  was  close  to  40  per  cent  and  that 
he  was  working  the  furnaces  at  just  about  the  top  notch  of 
efficiency. 

Now  it  is  one  thing  to  show  a  fireman  what  to  do  and  how 
to  do  it.  It  is  another  thing  to  have  him  do  it  when  nobody 
is  watching.  Everything  about  the  boilers  had  been  checked 
up  and  the  fireman  knew  exactly  how  to  get  efficiency  and 
a  lot  of  it.  It  was  now  just  a  matter  of  checking  up  the  fire¬ 
men.  A  gas  collecting  device  was  placed  on  each  boiler  so 
that  at  the  end  of  a  watch  it  could  be  known  in  a  few  min¬ 
utes  exactly  how  much  excess  air  had  flowed  across  the  heat¬ 
ing;  surfaces  of  the  boilers  during  that  watch.  The  engineer- 
now  had  the  means  of  exactly  rating  the  efficiency  of  each 
fireman. 

The  result  of  all  of  these  things  was  a  saving  in  that  plant 
of  more  than  5G  per  cent  of  the  fuel.  And  the  happiest  people 
about  the  plant  were  the  firemen.  They  were  now  handling 
less  than  one-half  of  the  coal  and  ashes  that  they  had  been 
handling  before.  They  had  learned  that  a  little  mental 
exercise  will  save  a  great  deal  of  manual  labor.  Skilful 
firing,  like  skilful  anything  else,  requires  some  thought  and 
a  reasonable  amount  of  attention  to  certain  details.  And  when 
a  man  knows  that  he  is  skilful  he  begins  to  take  pride  in  his 
skill.  This  is  human  nature — the  same  human  nature  that 
I  have  mentioned  before.  And,  Mr.  Manager,  take  advan¬ 
tage  of  human  nature  wherever  you  can.  If  you  don’t  do  it 
human  nature  will  take  advantage  of  you. 

The  table,  Chapter  I,  shows  about  how  the  other  losses 


68  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

between  the  mine  and  the  machine  occur.  I  have  touched  to 
sojne  extent  upon  all  of  the  losses  with  which  we  are  con¬ 
cerned  in  this  book,  except  that  due  to  soot  deposits  upon  the 
heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler.  This  will  receive  attention  in 
its  logical  place  in  a  later  chapter. 

Take  off  your  hat  to  the  next  load  of  coal  that  is  delivered 
to  your  bunkers.  It  contains  a  quantity  of  energy  that  is  quite 
beyond  our  powers  of  comprehension.  Remember  that  you 
are  wasting  98  per  cent  of  it.  I  have  in  my  desk  a  loaded 
cartridge  for  a  modern  high-power  rifle.  It  contains  a  pinch 
of  carbon  in  the  form  of  smokeless  powder.  There  is  enough 
sleeping  energy  there  to  strike  a  blow  of  more  than  a  foot 
ton  at  a  distance  of  one  mile.  There  are  twenty-nine  million 
heat  units*  in  your  ton  of  coal  and  each  one  of  them  when 
converted  into  mechanical  energy  is  good  for  778  foot  pounds. 
It  takes  a  good  sized  modern  locomotive  to  weigh  200  tons. 
Imagine  a  string  of  56,405  such  locomotives.  There  is  enough 
energy  in  your  ton  of  coal  to  raise  all  of  them  with  their 
drive  wheels  spinning  in  the  air  one  foot  above  the  rails. 
The  trouble  is  that  our  methods  of  transforming  and  applying 
this  energy  are  crude  and  inefficient.  Old  Mother  Nature  sat 
up  nights  for  more  than  five  million  years  to  prepare  this 
energy  for  us.  Men  toil  and  sometimes  die  in  coal  mines  to 
get  it  for  us.  We  buy  it  with  the  money  that  other  men  have 
toiled  and  sweated  to  produce.  And  after  you  get  that  ton  of 
coal  into  your  bunkers,  how  do  you  treat  it?  You  arm  an 
ignorant  fireman  with  a  90-cent  shovel  and  “sick”  him  on  it. 
Now  if  I  ask  your  fireman  anything  about  excess  air  or  the 
other  causes  of  fuel  loss  within  his  powers  of  prevention  he 
tries  to  rub  his  ears  off  with  his  shoulders.  The  shrug  is  his 
mode  of  expressing  an  absolute  and  ultimate  negation  of 
understanding.  Is  there  anything  about  the  bad  effects  of  cold 
air  on  boiler  surfaces  that  the  fireman  cannot  understand? 
Somebody  ought  to  explain  the  effects  of  air  holes  in  the  fire 
to  him.  He  needs  a  little  teaching.  But  nobody  ever  heard 
of  anybody  teaching  any  fireman  anything  in  your  boiler 
bouse.  Your  engineer  knows  that  it  is  bad  to  allow  cold  air 

*PERHAPS: — A  heat  unit,  or  one  B.  t.  u.,  is  the  quantity 
of  heat  required  to  raise  one  pound  of  water  one  degree  F.  in 
temperature. 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


69 


to  flow  in  upon  the  tubes  in  the  first  pass  of  his  water  tube 
boilers,  and  yet  I  can  shove  a  full-grown  tom  cat  through  some 
of  the  holes  around  his  boiler  headers.  Maybe  you  think  I  am 
lying  about  the  air  leaks.  Go  and  see  for  yourself  before  you 
come  to  such  conclusion.  The  trouble  with  the  engineer  is  * 
that  he  hasn’t  thought  about  these  things.  He  just  needs  a 
jolt  from  somebody  and  I  am  trying  to  jolt  him.  The  trouble 
with  the  Manager  is  that  he  believes  the  fuel  economy  ques¬ 
tion  to  be  outside  the  purview  of  his  jurisdiction.  He  leaves 
all  such  things  to  the  superintendent  or  the  engineer  or  some¬ 
body  else  below  him.  As  Dr.  Dowie  used  to  express  it,  “He 
doesn’t  believe  in  keeping  a  dog  and  doing  his  own  barking;” 
The  result  is  that  nobody  barks  about  fuel  economy  in  your 
power  plant  and  that  is  the  reason  for  my  barking  and 
howling. 


YOU  ARE  WATCHING  THE  SPIGOT  IN 
THE  ENGINE  ROOM  AND  FORGETTING 
THE  BUNGHOLE  IN  THE  BOILER  HOUSE. 


-Apologies  to  The  Saturday  Evening  Post. 


Mr.  Engineer,  the  time  has  come  for  you  to  leave  the 
Stillson  wrench  and  the  oil  can  to  the  attention  of  somebody 


70 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


else.  The  boiler  room  is  the  place  where  you  can  save  your 
employer’s  money.  Let  me  give  you  a  tip:  If  you  do  not 
interest  yourself  in  combustion,  steam  engineering  will  not 
be  interested  very  much  longer  in  you.  Engineers  who  do 
not  understand  the  trick  of  making  steam  with  real  economy 
will  be  physicked  out  of  boiler  plants  by  the  wholesale  before 
you  are  very  much  older. 

v'ou  ought  to  get  out  in  the  boiler  room  several  times  a 
day  and  have  it  out  with  Casey,  because  you  know  that  he  is 
wasting  fuel.  But  you  do  not  do  that.  You  are  afraid  that 
Casey  would  either  “bean”  you  with  a  lump  of  coal  or  quit  the 
job  if  you  said  anything,  and  so  you  hide  around  the  corner, 
scratch  your  head,  pray  that  the  “old  man”  will  not  get  his 
eyes  on  the  coal  bill  and  swear  at  Casey,  while  he  quite 
calmly  bucks  the  coal  to  keep  your  boilers  going  and  you 
either  have  no  steam  at  all  or  else  the  safety’s  blowing.  The 
coal  he  wastes  for  you  each  day  would  pay  your  weekly 
wages.  This  waste  destroys  your  peace  of  mind,  your  very 
soul  enrages.  Your  job,  you  know,  depends  upon  this  matter 
of  expenses.  You  must  keep  down  the  fuel  bills  or  take  the 


Patrick  Aloysius  Casey. 


How  Your  Fuel  Is  Wasted. 


71 


consequences.  And  when  the  monthly  coal  bill  comes  and  says 
“six  hundred  dollars,”  you  shake  and  quake;  it’s  awful,  how 
the  “old  man”  swears  and  hollers.  You  think  your  job  is  gone, 
for  sure.  Despair  engulfs  your  soul,  while  Casey  merely 
grunts  and  spits  and  fills  her  up  with  coal.  You  don’t  know 
how  it  all  will  end.  Your  heart  is  heavy — very.  You’d  fight 
him,  but  you  do  not  dare,  for  Casey  comes  from  Kerry. 


“Eb  Haskins’  sow  and  pigs  kept  a  gittin  in  his  garden  and 
a  rootin  of  it  up.  Eb  stopped  all  of  the  little  holes  in  the 
pickets  but  the  durned  fool  forgot  that  the  gate  was  off’n  the 
hinges.” 

Down  East  Tales. 


The  thing  that  needs  it  worst 
Should  always  get  it  first. 


When  your  house  is  afire  and  the  garden  needs  watering 
which  way  do  you  run  with  a  pail  of  water? 


You  are  concerned  about  the  chance  to  save  a  nickel  in 
the  engine  room — so  much  concerned  that  you  forget  about 
the  loss  of  the  Dollars  in  the  boiler  room. 


72  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

CHAPTER  III. 

HOW  TO  “SPOT”  YOUR  FUEL  WASTES. 

Now  that  we  know  how  the  wastes  occur  and  about  where 
to  look  for  them  we  will  visit  your  boiler  room  and  take  a 
look  at  them.  I  have  been  harping  on  25  per  cent  in  the 
first  two  chapters  as  a  measure  of  the  preventable  wastes  in 
the  boiler  room.  I  don’t  know  what  your  losses  are  because 
I  was  never  in  your  boiler  room.  I  do  know  that  if  the  “hit 
or  miss,”  “catch  as  catch  can”  methods  prevailing  in  the 
average  plant  are  to  be  found  in  yours,  that  your  preventable 
furnace  wastes,  when  we  come  to  measure  them,  will  be 
mighty  close  to  a  quarter  of  your  coal. 

Some  twenty  questions  were  propounded  to  the  engineer 
in  the  first  chapter,  and  he  is  entitled  to  know  exactly  how 
those  questions  may  be  answered.  We  will  get  ready  to 
answer  some  of  them. 

WHAT  IS  THE  EFFICIENCY  OF  YOUR  BOILER  FURNACES? 

I  put  that  question  last  summer  to  the  Manager  of  a  big 
Southern  factory.  “Wait  a  moment,”  said  he,  “and  I  will 
tell  you.”  He  pushed  a  button,  wrote  a  message  on  a  slip  of 
paper  and  sent  it  out  by  the  office  boy.  In  a  few  moments  the 
paper  was  returned  and  this  statement  had  been  endorsed 
upon  it  by  the  chief  engineer:  “We  produce  a  kilowatt  with 
5.341  pounds  of  coal.”  The  Manager  smiled  in  a  satisfied 
way  as  he  handed  me  the  paper.  “There’s  the  answer  to  your 
question,”  said  he,  “worked  out  to  three  decimal  places.” 

I  replied,  “Your  answer  is  not  responsive  to  my  question.” 
Every  time  I  ask  an  engineer  about  the  efficiency  of  his 
furnaces  he  begins  to  talk  about  something  else — usually 
about  the  cost  per  kilowatt  hour.  Sometimes  he  has  infor¬ 
mation  on  the  pounds  of  water  evaporated  per  pound  of  coal 
burned,  which  is  closer  to  the  point  but  still  a  long  way 
from  it.  In  either  case  he  is  giving  me  the  two  ends  of  the 
process  only,  and  leaving  me  entirely  in  the  dark  as  to  what 
is  taking  place  between  the  extremes.  Now  I  have  nothing 
against  your  kilowatts  and  what-nots.  It  is  of  considerable 
importance  that  you  should  know  the  cost  per  kilowatt  hour 
as  it  gives  you  a  line  on  the  over-all  efficiency  of  your  plant. 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes . 


73 

But  that  is  all  it  does  do.  Is  there  anything  about  that  figure 
of  5.341  pounds  of  coal  per  kilowatt  hour  that  will  enable  you 
to  place  your  finger  on  any  specific  thing  about  your  power 
plant  and  to  say  as  you  do  so,  “We  are  wasting  fuel  here; 
we  must  do  this  and  that  and  after  we  have  done  it  we  shall 
have  reduced  the  coal  consumption  per  kilowatt  hour?  Your 
engineer’s  bookkeeping  is  good  as  far  as  it  goes,  but  it  does 
not  go  far  enough  It  analyzes  nothing  for  us  and  hence  it 
gets  us  nowhere 

Now  if  you  will  take  up  the  different  factors  in  your 
power  plant,  one  at  a  time,  and  scrutinize  each  of  them  with¬ 
out  relation  to  any  other  you  will  get  some  information  that 
means  something  If  you  will  bring  each  factor  up  to  the 
highest  possible  state  of  efficiency  you  won’t  need  to  worry 
about  the  cost  per  kilowatt  hour  It  will  take  care  of  itself. 
It  will  be  as  low  as  it  is  possible  to  get  it  and  you  will  have  to 
be  satisfied  with  it,  whatever  it  is.  No  amount  of  bookkeep¬ 
ing  will  change  it.  If  I  should  ask  you  about  the  efficiency 
of  your  stenographer  would  it  be  a  responsive  answer  to  tell 
me  what  your  gross  annual  sales  were  last  year?  Or  if  I 
should  ask  you  how  you  are  feeling  this  morning,  would  it 
be  a  responsive  answer  to  say  that  your  family,  consisting  of 
your  wife,  your  three  children,  your  mother-in-law,  the  hired 
girl  and  yourself,  were  50  per  cent  well?  Now,  when  I  try 
to  find  out  how  much  coal  you  are  wasting  at  the  boiler 
furnace  you  give  me  a  figure,  that,  if  I  knew  the  heat  value 
of  your  coal,  would  tell  me  something  about  the  combined 
efficiency  of  the  fireman,  the  furnace,  the  boiler,  the  econo¬ 
mizer,  the  superheater,  the  engine,  the  generator  and  the 
lubricating  oil.  We  can’t  convict  anything  on  the  cost  per 
kilowatt  hour.  The  figure  may  tell  us  that  something  is 
wrong  somewhere,  but  that  is  all  it  does  tell  us.  It  is  of  no 
fuel-saving,  money-making  use  to  us. 

Much  of  the  bookkeeping  in  power  plants  is  useless  be¬ 
cause  it  leads  to  nothing.  In  what  way  does  it  help  you  to 
know  the  cost  per  kilowatt  hour  if  the  information  does  not 
assist  you  to  reduce  the  cost  per  kilowatt  hour?  You  can 
get  your  cost  of  power  by  adding  up  each  month  all  of  the 
expenses  that  the  power  house  has  incurred  and  including 


74 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


a  charge  for  interest  and  depreciation.  Such  general  infor¬ 
mation  will  enable  the  manufacturer  to  determine  the  power 
cost  per  unit  quantity  of  his  product  and  this  is  necessary  to 
his  cost-keeping  system.  It  is  valuable  also  for  purposes  of 
comparison.  Month  can  be  compared  with  month  and  fiscal 
period  with  fiscal  period.  The  unit  fuel  cost  can  also  be 
compared  with  that  of  other  factories  in  the  same  industry. 
While  such  comparison  may  result  in  satisfaction  it  is  not 
likely  to  result  in  anything  else.  The  fact  that  you  are  pro¬ 
ducing  power  at  less  cost  per  unit  of  product  than  your 
neighbor  does  not  prove  that  you  are  producing  it  econom¬ 
ically.  There  are  degrees  of  waste.  If  the  other  fellow  is 
wasting  40  per  cent  that  is  no  reason  why  you  should  be 
complacent  with  a  waste  of  20  per  cent. 

I  am  not  the  first  man  to  criticise  the  current  system  of 
power  house  bookkeeping.  The  following  is  quoted  from 
one  of  the  most  prominent  efficiency  engineers  in  the  United 
States: 

“Consequently,  the  common  practice  is  to  compare  the  data 
at  two  extreme  ends  of  process.  Let  us  take,  for  instance,  the 
number  of  pounds  of  coal  at  one  end  and  the  number  of  kilowatt 
hours  generated  at  the  other.  With  no  knowledge  of  the  heat¬ 
ing  valu-e  of  coal  used,  nor  the  number  of  B.  t.  u.  consumed  per 
kilowatt  hour,  nor  even  of  the  mechanical  efficiency  of  the 
equipment,  we  shall  not  be  any  the  wiser  as  to  the  stage  of  the 
whole  process  in  which  the  loss  occurs,  nor  how  big  it  is.  We 
ought  to  know  precisely  how  much  is  lost  in  certain  steps  of  the 
transformation  of  energy  from  one  form  into  another.” 

The  engineer  will  get  some  ideas  on  sensible  power  cost 
bookkeeping  if  he  will  study  the  nurse’s  daily  chart  the  next 
time  he  is  laid  up  in  the  hospital.  The  nurse  is  careful  to 
record  every  fact  relating  to  the  patient’s  condition  in  which 
the  doctor  is  interested.  She  brushes  the  patient’s  teeth  and 
trims  his  toe  nails,  but  she  does  not  encumber  the  chart  with 
these  inconsequential  details.  She  writes  down  only  what 
the  doctor  wants  to  know  and  when  the  physician  arrives 
he  looks  at  the  chart  before  he  looks  at  the  patient. 

There  are  engineers  who  make  a  careful  record  of  every¬ 
thing  without  regard  to  what  is  important  and  what  is  not. 
Such  bookkeeping  is  laborious,  expensive  and  to  a  large  extent 
useless.  There  are  other  engineers  who  never  make  a  record 
of  anything.  The  sensible  practice  as  to  bookkeeping  lies 
between  the  two  extremes. 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


75 


RECORDS  OF  MAINTENANCE 


Dote 


BOILER 

TUBES  BLOWN 

MUD  BLOWN 

CUT 

OUT 

Cmr  \WA5HED 

SCALD  REMOVED 

l 

2 

! 

3 

4- 

COMBUSTION 

CHAMBER  CLEANED 

CONDITION  OB 
BARRELING 

C  CD  NO  Oh 
BR/CK  WORK 

OOrVD  OB 
BLOW  ORE 

i 

2 

3 

RER4/R5  WEEDED 


SO/L-ER  E>UF>T 


I  shall  not  attempt  to  outline  any  system  of  power  house 
bookkeeping.  The  records  that  you  do  employ,  to  be  of  use, 
must  be  to  the  point  and  reach  the  spot.  Whatever  else  they 
may  show,  they  should  indicate  the  causes  of  waste  and 
measure  the  effects.  They  should  keep  the  physical  condition 
of  the  boiler  plant  constantly  before  the  Engineer  and  Man¬ 
ager.  There  should  be  records  of  maintenance  as  well  as 
records  of  operation.  If  you  will  make  some  one  man  per¬ 
sonally  responsible  for  the  physical  condition  of  your  furnaces 
and  boilers  and  require  signed  reports  on  blanks  furnished, 
you  will  not  be  bothered  with  soot  and  scale,  with  broken 
down  baffles  or  with  leaks  in  the  brick  work  of  the  boiler 
settings. 

Where  nobody  reports  to  anybody  about  anything  and 
nobody  is  made  responsible  for  anything,  nothing  need  be 
expected  because  nobody  is  interested. 

The  illustration  on  next  page  is  not  an  exaggeration.  The 
boiler  is  not  covered  and  the  setting  is  disintegrating.  You 
can  actually  find  boilers  and  settings  in  that  condition.  The 


76 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


boilers  in  your  plant  are  covered,  of  course,  but  there  are 
leaks  in  the  settings,  as  serious  in  the  aggregate,  perhaps,  as 
those  shown  in  the  picture.  I  visited  a  large  power  plant  in 
Brooklyn  and  the  brick  work  of  the  boiler  was  in  worse 
shape  than  the  horrible  example  at  which  you  are  looking. 
They  were  “expecting  to  re-set  the  boilers”  at  some  time  in 
the  indefinite  future  and  hence  they  did  not  consider  it  worth 
while  to  do  anything  to  “those  old  settings.”  A  few  dollars’ 
worth  of  material  and  a  few  more  dollars’  worth  of  time 
would  have  calked  the  settings  of  the  ten  boilers  and  the 
firm  would  have  made  about  100  per  cent  a  day  on  the 
investment. 

It  is  much  the  same  old  story  wherever  you  may  go  visit¬ 
ing  power  plants.  Conditions  exist  in  the  boiler  room  that 
would  not  be  permitted  in  any  other  department  of  the  factory. 
Hence  the  waste  of  a  quarter  of  the  fuel. 

By  what  criterion  shall  the  efficiency  of  a  furnace  be 
judged? 

THAT  FURNACE  IS  THE  MOST  EFFICIENT  WHICH 
COMPLETELY  CONSUMES  THE  COMBUSTIBLE  WITH 
THE  LEAST  SURPLUS  OF  AIR. 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


77 


Here  we  have  the  whole  thing  in  a  very  small  nut-shell. 
No  matter  where  we  start  or  in  which  direction  we  proceed, 
whether  we  consider  the  subject  of  drafts,  of  fuels,  of  methods 
of  firing  or  what  not,  it  is  just  a  question  of  complete  com¬ 
bustion  with  the  minimum  of  air.  Fix  this  in  your  mind  and 
much  of  the  “mystery”  will  fall  away  from  the  combustion 
problems  that  have  been  troubling  you. 

Flue  gas  analysis  answers  every  question  bearing  upon 
the  efficiency  of  the  furnace  proper,  but  it  tells  us  absolutely 
nothing  about  boiler  efficiency.  No  other  form  of  furnace  test 
ever  has  been  or  ever  will  be  devised  to  supersede  it.  The 
furnace  exists  solely  for  the  gases  that  are  delivered  from 
it,  as  it  is  from  these  heat  laden  gases  that  the  boiler  derives 
the  energy  necessary  to  its  functions.  Every  judgment  upon 
furnace  efficiency  must  therefore  be  based  upon  an  inquiry 
into  the  furnace  gases.  I  can  prove  it  by  scripture.  The 
gases  are  the  fruits  of  the  furnace  and  “By  their  fruits  ye 
shall  know  them.” 

When  it  is  suggested  that  a  test  should  be  run  upon  the 
boiler  furnace  the  engineer  by  force  of  habit  begins  to  think 
of  the  standard  evaporation  test  because  it  is  the  only  test 
with  which  most  engineers  are  familiar.  There  can  be  no 
quarrel  with  this  test  if  it  is  a  complete  one  and  properly 
conducted.  It  is  incomplete  unless  sufficient  combustion  facts 
are  gathered  to  enable  us  to  judge  the  furnace  as  a  thing  quite 
apart  from  the  boiler.  The  boiler  has  nothing  to  do  with 
combustion  and  the  furnace  has  nothing  to  do  with  evapora¬ 
tion.  You  do  not  burn  coal  in  the  boiler  nor  evaporate  water 
in  the  furnace.  Hence  when  we  are  considering  furnace 
efficiency  alone,  no  question  as  to  water  evaporated  should 
enter  the  problem  and  add  its  complications. 

The  business  of  the  furnace  is  to  transform  the  heat 
energy  contained  in  the  coal — to  change  it  from  the  latent  to 
the  active  condition  and  to  deliver  it  in  such  condition 
undiluted  and  unmodified  to  the  boiler. 

The  business  of  the  boiler  is  to  take  the  heat  energy  from 
the  carrier  gases  and  make  steam  with  it.  We  may  have  a 
very  efficient  furnace  delivering  heat  energy  to  a  very  inef¬ 
ficient  boiler.  The  furnace  is  not  to  blame  for  the  character 


78 


Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


or  physical  condition  of  the  boiler.  The  only  exception  that 
must  be  made  to  this  statement  relates  to  soot  deposits  and 
in  many  cases  these  deposits  are  the  fault  of  the  boiler  and  not 
of  the  furnace. 

There  was  a  time  when  furnaces  and  stokers  were  sold 
under  specified  guaranties  of  evaporation.  The  wonder  is 
that  manufacturers  ever  stood  for  such  an  unfair  method  of 
judging  their  products.  The  leading  furnace  and  stoker 
people  are  getting  away  from  it  and  refusing  to  assume 
responsibility  for  the  boilers  that  they  do  not  furnish.  They 
are  guaranteeing  furnace  performance  without  reference  to 
evaporation  and  the  efficiency  of  the  furnace  is  determined  by 
an  examination  of  the  gases  that  it  passes  along  to  the  boiler. 
This  is  the  only  fair  method  and  the  only  scientific  one. 

You  do  not  try  on  your  coat  to  determine  whether  your 
pants  fit,  and  if  the  pants  are  too  long  in  the  legs  you  do 
not  remedy  the  trouble  by  cutting  off  your  coat  tails.  Pants 
are  a  part  of  a  suit  of  clothes,  just  as  a  furnace  is  a  part 
of  a  steam  generating  plant  and  as  the  study  we  are  about 
to  make  relates  primarily  to  the  furnace  we  will  leave  the 
boiler  out  of  it  as  far  as  it  is  possible  to  do  so.  The  subject 
of  boiler  scale  is  of  such  compelling  importance  that  I  have 
been  tempted  to  deal  with  it  here  in  connection  with  furnace 
problems.  I  am  precluded  by  lack  of  space  from  doing  so. 
We  will  stick  to  the  furnace  proper  as  far  as  possible.  We  are 
forced,  however,  to  consider  the  subject  of  air  dilution  at  all 
points  between  the  furnace  and  the  chimney  and  we  must 
also  take  the  question  of  the  “short-circuiting”  of  the  gases 
into  account.  It  is  quite  impossible  to  make  a  proper  combus¬ 
tion  study  without  considering  the  physical  state  of  the  walls 
that  enclose  the  boiler  and  of  the  baffles  that  direct  the  flow 
of  the  gases  through  the  boiler.  For  the  purposes  of  this 
study  we  will  consider  the  boiler  damper  and  everything 
except  the  naked  boiler  itself  as  a  part  of  the  furnace. 

The  efficiency  of  the  furnace  depends  upon  the  efficiency 
of  combustion  within  the  furnace  and  the  safeguarding  of 
the  gases  from  outside  influences  until  they  have  left  the 
heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler.  Now  it  is  quite  impossible  for 
anyone  to  look  at  a  boiler  and  furnace  and  pronounce  a 


How  to  “ Spot ”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


79 


definite  judgment  upon  the  efficiency  of  either  of  them.  We 
can  tell  in  a  general  way  whether  combustion  is  efficient  or 
inefficient  by  observing  the  color  of  the  flame  and  noting  the 
condition  of  the  fuel  in  the  furnace,  but  the  judgment  of  the 
observer  might  be  10  or  20  per  cent  at  fault.  The  fuel  itself 
has  much  to  do  with  appearances  in  the  furnace.  What 
applies  to  one  fuel  and  one  furnace  will  not  apply  at  all  to 
another.  And  even  if  it  were  possible  to  look  at  a  furnace  and 
say,  “This  furnace  is  doing  absolutely  all  that  can  be  expected 
of  it,”  it  would  be  quite  impossible  to  say  that  the  boiler  was 
having  a  fair  chance  at  the  hot  gases  delivered  by  the  furnace. 

There  are  four  large  water  tube  boilers  in  the  sub-base¬ 
men  of  a  well-known  New  York  office  building.  Three  of  these 
boilers  were  good  steamers.  The  fourth  was  a  shirker.  Its 
furnace  received  as  much  attention  as  the  others.  The  boiler 
walls  and  baffling  were  carefully  looked  after.  The  tubes 
were  known  to  be  clean  of  soot  and  scale.  But  the  boiler  just 
balked  and  wouldn’t  steam,  and  what  ailed  it  was  a  problem. 
The  gases  leaving  that  boiler  were  finally  examined  with  a 
Flue  Gas  Analyzer  and  it  was  found  that  they  carried  a  high 
percentage  of  excess  air.  It  was  a  mystery  where  this  excess 
was  getting  access  to  the  boiler.  The  engineer  was  willing 
to  swear  that  there  were  no  air  leaks  anywhere  about  the 
boiler  and  the  analyzer  declared  there  was  a  big  air  leak 
somewhere.  The  boiler  was  shut  down  and  the  engineer 
crawled  into  the  combustion  chamber,  where  he  found  the 
trouble.  It  had  been  the  practice  at  one  time  to  sluice  the 
ashes  through  a  12-inch  conduit  which  extended  from  the 
ash  pit  back  under  the  combustion  chamber  to  the  rear  of 
the  boiler.  Another  method  of  ash  handling  had  been 
adopted  and  the  conduit  was  forgotten.  It  had  been  broken 
through  by  some  laborer  when  cleaning  out  the  combustion 
chamber  and  the  result  was  an  air  leak  into  the  combustion 
chamber  12  inches  in  diameter. 

Many  stories  having  a  similar  bearing  upon  the  subject 
could  be  related.  If  there  is  more  than  40  per  cent  excess 
air  in  the  gases  as  they  leave  the  heating  surfaces  of  the 
boiler,  something  is  wrong  somewhere.  An  exception  must 
be  entered  to  this  rule  if  the  coal  contains  an  abnormal  per- 


80 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


centage  of  ash  or  if  the  ash  has  a  disposition  to  fuse  at  low 
temperature.  In  such  circumstances  it  is  impossible  to  burn 
the  coal  effectively  with  as  little  as  40  per  cent  air  excess. 
It  has  been  estimated  that  when  the  coal  carries  40  per  cent 
ash  the  efficiency  of  the  heat  unit  is  zero. 

Let  us  now  tackle  one  of  your  boilers  and  make  an  exact 

diagnosis  of  the  combustion  troubles  which  afflict  efficiency. 

« 

We  shall  require  the  following  apparatus: 

1.  Some  tallow  candles. 

2.  A  flue  gas  analyzer. 

3.  A  sensitive  differential  draft  gage. 

4.  A  high  temperature  thermometer  or  pyrometer. 

We  will  begin  our  study  with  the  analyzer  and  we  shall 
need  a  piece  of  one-eighth  or  one-quarter-inch  gas  pipe  long 
enough  to  reach  the  center  of  the  gas  “flow”  at  the  place 
where  the  gases  leave  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler. 

In  another  chapter  I  have  discussed  Gas  Analyzers  and 
other  forms  of  testing  apparatus,  explaining  the  principles 
upon  which  they  depend  and  the  methods  of  operation.  As  to 
the  requisites  of  an  Analyzer  for  making  a  study  of  furnace 
conditions  I  will  merely  say  here  that  speed  is  absolutely 
essential.  The  conditions  in  the  furnace  may  change  from 
instant  to  instant  and  when  a  sample  of  gas  is  taken  for 
analysis,  all  of  the  conditions  obtaining  when  the  sample  is 
drawn  must  be  observed  and  a  record  made  of  them,  other¬ 
wise  we  shall  be  unable  to  interpret  the  real  meaning  of  any 
analysis  we  may  make.  For  example,  we  want  to  know  the 
effect  that  the  slightest  change  in  the  draft  will  have  upon 
the  volume  of  excess  air  flowing  through  the  furnace.  We 
wish  to  make  five  or  six  tests  as  close  together  as  possible, 
varying  the  draft  for  each  test.  Now  the  excess  of  air  will 
be  affected  by  changes  in  the  condition  of  the  fuel  on  the 
grates  as  well  as  by  changes  of  the  draft.  As  the  fuel  burns 
down  the  resistance  to  the  passage  of  the  air  will  be  less  and 
a  small  fissure  may  form  in  the  fuel  bed  at  any  moment, 
letting  in  quite  a  volume  of  air.  This  would,  of  course,  affect 
the  result  and  we  should  have  no  means  of  knowing  whether 
the  change  in  the  volume  of  excess  air  indicated  by  the 
Analyzer  was  due  to  the  change  in  the  draft  or  the  change  in 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


81 


the  conditions  in  the  furnace.  Hence  speed  in  operating  the 
Gas  Analyzer  is  a  requisite  of  the  highest  importance  when  we 
are  diagnosing  furnace  conditions.  Failure  to  appreciate  this 
fact  has  led  to  many  wrong  conclusions  by  engineers  and  some 
of  them  have  formed  quite  erroneous  impressions  of  the  value 
of  flue  gas  analysis  on  account  of  it. 

The  gas  sample  should  be  taken  from  the  point  where  the 
gases  leave  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler.  It  should  be 
taken  from  the  center  of  the  gas  flow  at  that  point  and  it 
should  be  taken  through  a  length  of  ordinary  one-eighth  or 
one-quarter  inch  iron  gas  pipe.  Under  no  circumstances  use 
a  perforated  pipe.  If  you  take  the  gas  sample  at  any  other 
place  or  in  any  other  way,  you  will  not  get  the  information 
you  are  after.  I  must  make  the  reasons  for  these  suggestions 
as  clear  as  possible,  because  it  is  by  disregarding  them  that 
the  beginner  with  the  Gas  Analyzer  makes  his  first  mistakes. 

The  sample  should  be  taken  at  a  point  where  the  gases 
leave  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler  because  you  wish  to 
catch  all  of  the  air  leakage  that  is  really  affecting  efficiency. 
Any  outside  air  that  may  find  its  way  into  the  boiler  passes 
between  that  point  and  the  furnace  will  reduce  efficiency. 
If  your  gas  sample  is  taken  from  the  first  pass  of  the  boiler 
you  will  miss  all  of  the  air  that  is  flowing  into  the  second 
and  third  passes.  The  reading  of  the  analyzer  would  tell 
you  the  extent  of  air  dilution  in  the  first  pass,  but  nothing 
about  the  final  condition  of  the  gases,  and  it  is  the  final  condi¬ 
tion  that  you  are  after.  For  the  same  reasons  it  would  be 
the  very  worst  of  bad  practice  to  take  the  gas  sample  from 
the  breeching  or  any  other  point  beyond  the  heating  surfaces 
of  the  boiler.  It  is  quite  certain  that  there  are  air  leaks 
around  the  breeching  connection  and  quite  likely  through 
the  seams  of  the  breeching  itself.  If  the  sample  is  taken 
from  the  first  pass  the  analysis  may  indicate  much  less 
damaging  excess  than  really  exists  and  if  taken  from  the 
breeching  it  is  almost  sure  to  indicate  a  great  deal  more. 

The  temperature  of  the  escaping  flue  gases  should  be 
taken  at  the  same  point  where  the  gas  sample  is  obtained  and 
for  the  same  reasons.  You  want  to  know  how  hot  the  gases 
are  when  they  leave  the  boiler,  not  how  hot  they  may  be  after 


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How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


they  have  chilled  down  by  radiation  and  air  leakage  beyond 
the  boiler. 

Air  leakage  into  the  breeching  will  not  lower  the  efficiency 
of  the  boiler  in  ordinary  circumstances.  Under  certain  con¬ 
ditions  it  might  improve  efficiency  by  cutting  down  the  draft 
as  the  tendency  in  most  boiler  plants  is  to  use  too  much  draft. 

I  visited  a  power  plant  not  long  ago  and  found  an  evap¬ 
oration  test  in  progress.  Gas  samples  were  being  drawn  regu¬ 
larly  into  a  bottle  at  one  hour  intervals  and  carried  to  the 
laboratory,  where  they  were  carefully  analyzed  by  the  plant 
chemist.  He  was  very  careful  to  determine  the  exact  per¬ 
centages  of  CO2  (Carbon  Dioxide),  O2  (Oxygen)  and  CO 
(.Carbon  Monoxide).  The  boys  were  going  to  work  out  a  heat 
balance  at  the  conclusion  of  the  test  and  to  this  end  they 
were  very  anxious  that  the  gas  analyses  should  be  made 
just  right.  The  weights  of  coal  burned  from  hour  to  hour 
and  the  reports  of  the  water  and  steam  flow  meters  indicated 
a  very  high  efficiency,  while  the  chemist’s  reports  on  the  gas 
samples  indicated  a  low  efficiency — a  very  large  volume  of 
excess  air.  They  couldn’t  understand  it.  The  man  in  charge 
of  the  test  had  forgotten  more  about  electrical  engineering 
than  I  will  ever  know,  but  he  didn’t  know  the  “A.  B.  C.”  of 
practical  flue  gas  analysis.  “What  do  you  think  of  that  6 
per  cent  CO2?”  he  asked  me.  I  was  forced  to  tell  him  that  it 
was  “rotten”  and  that  he  ought  to  be  getting  about  14  per 
cent.  “I  will  give  you  five  dollars,”  he  said,  “if  you  will 
show  me  how  to  make  that  Roney  stoker  do  any  better  than 
it  is  doing  right  now.”  We  looked  at  the  fires  and  they  were 
dazzling  white.  We  looked  at  them  through  smoked  glasses 
and  there  was  no  sign  of  an  air  leak  in  the  fuel  bed  any¬ 
where.  “I  can’t  show  you  how  to  work  a  Roney  stoker,”  I 
said,  “but  I  can  show  you  something  about  analyzing  flue 
gases.  From  what  point  are  you  taking  the  gas  samples?” 
“Why,”  said  he,  “from  the  uptake  of  the  boiler,  of  course; 
from  what  point  would  you  take  them?” 

We  got  a  ladder  and  climbed  to  the  top  of  the  boiler. 
The  gas  samples  were  being  drawn  from  the  uptake,  above 
the  boiler  damper  and  about  12  feet  above  the  drums  of  the 
boiler.  There  was  more  air  going  in  around  the  hood  of 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


83 


that  uptake  than  was  being  taken  through  the  fuel  on 
the  grates  of  the  stoker.  The  gas  samples  over  which  his 
chemist  was  working  with  such  great  care  to  insure  exact 
determinations  were  utterly  worthless.  We  then  took  a  gas 
sample  from  the  last  pass  of  the  boiler  and  the  very  first 
reading  showed  more  than  15  per  cent  CO2,  indicating  an 
air  excess  in  the  last  pass  of  less  than  40  per  cent,  while  the 
samples  taken  from  the  uptake  were  showing  an  air  excess 
of  nearly  250  per  cent. 

One  gas  sample  per  hour  is  very  little  better  than  no  gas 
sample  at  all.  It  was  not  enough  to  indicate  an  average.  To 
indicate  anything  approaching  the  real  average  the  samples 
should  be  taken  as  often  as  once  every  five  minutes  and  it 
would  be  better  to  have  a  continuous  sample.  The  conditions 
in  the  furnace  affecting  the  flue  gases  are  not  constant,  even 
with  the  best  types  of  stokers. 

Don’t  forget  this:  The  gas  sample  must  be  taken  at  the 
point  where  the  gases  leave  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler, 
wherever  that  point  may  be.  Where  that  point  may  be 
located  and  how  you  are  going  to  reach  it  with  a  piece  of  gas 
pipe,  will  depend  upon  the  type  of  your  boiler. 

Remember  the  boiler  damper  when  you  are  placing  the 
Sampling  Tube.  The  gas  currents  may  be  deflected  by  the 
damper  and  leave  the  Sampling  Tube  in  a  dead  air  space. 
The  tube  must  be  in  the  gas  currents,  whatever  the  position 
of  the  damper,  and  it  must  be  so  located  that  it  will  be  in 
the  gas  currents  for  all  positions  of  the  damper. 

If  it  is  a  boiler  of  the  “B.  &  W.”  type  you  can  thrust  the 
gas  pipe  through  the  top  “blow  hole”  at  the  last  pass  and  let 
the  pipe  rest  upon  the  boiler  tubes.  If  it  is  of  the  “Heine” 
type  you  can  run  the  gas  pipe  through  one  of  the  hollow 
stay  bolt  holes.  If  it  is  a  return  tubular  boiler  you  can  re¬ 
move  the  top  “handle”  from  one  of  the  boiler  doors.  This  will 
provide  a  hole  through  which  the  gas  pipe  may  be  passed, 
and  you  must  be  sure  that  you  are  not  getting  any  of  the  air 
that  leaks  around  the  boiler  doors  into  the  smoke  box.  The 
gases  will  leave  the  boiler  tubes  and  rise  in  a  curve  to  the 
uptake.  Between  these  curving  gas  currents  and  the  boiler 
doors  there  will  be  a  current  of  air  on  its  way  to  the  uptake 


84 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency 


Incorrect  positions  of  the  sampling-  tube. 


“X”  shows  the  correct  location  for  gas  sampling  pipe — “Y”  and 
“Z”  the  incorrect  locations.  The  points  marked  “AL.”  show 
some  of  the  places  where  air  leakage  is  likely  to  be  found.  If 
the  “baffling”  is  in  bad  condition  the  gases  may  “short- 
circuit,”  as  shown  by  the  arrows  “S”  “S.” 


and  the  volume  of  the  air  stream  will  depend  upon  the  amount 
of  the  air  leakage  around  the  boiler  doors.  Your  gas  pipe 
must  pass  through  this  stream  of  air  and  its  open  end  must 


Hoiv  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


85 


be  in  the  gas  currents.  In  ordinary  circumstances  the  pipe 
should  extend  to  within  about  six  inches  of  the  boiler  head 
and  it  should  be  above  the  top  row  of  tubes.  If  the  pipe 
should  be  thrust  in  too  far  it  might  extend  beyond  the  curving 
flow  of  the  gas  currents  and  enter  a  “dead  air”  space.  Be 
certain  that  you  are  getting  none  of  that  air  leakage  around 
the  boiler  doors.  If  you  are  not  certain,  stop  the  leaks  tem¬ 
porarily  and  if  this  is  impracticable  insert  the  gas  pipe  in  one 
of  the  boiler  tubes  as  the  next  best  expedient.  This  will  give 
you  gas  from  but  one  of  the  boiler  tubes  and  you  want  a 
composite  sample  from  as  many  of  the  tubes  as  possible.. 
I  have  found  by  experiment,  however,  that  an  analysis  of  the 
gas  taken  from  one  tube  will  compare  very  closely  with  that 
of  a  sample  taken  in  the  preferred  way,  as  above  indicated,, 
provided  the  tube  selected  is  near  the  center  of  the  boiler. 
If  there  is  much  air  leakage  between  the  arch  at  the  rear  of 
the  boiler  and  the  boiler  head,  a  sample  taken  from  one  of 
the  top  row  of  tubes  might  show  more  excess  than  a  sample 
taken  lower  down,  as  most  of  the  air  flowing  in  at  the  arch 
would  find  its  way  into  the  top  row  of  tubes. 

Many  years  ago  somebody  suggested  the  use  of  a  per¬ 
forated  metal  pipe  for  gas  sampling  purposes.  It  was  pro¬ 
posed  that  a  gas  pipe  long  enough  to  extend  entirely  across 
the  boiler  should  be  used,  that  this  pipe  should  be  capped 
or  plugged  at  the  end  and  perforated  with  small  holes  at 
measured  intervals — the  theory  being  that  when  suction  was 
applied  to  the  pipe  each  of  the  holes  would  furnish  its  quota 
of  gas  and  that  the  sample  secured  would  represent  an  average 
of  the  gases  flowing  through  the  cross  section  of  the  boiler 
pass  in  which  the  pipe  was  extended.  The  use  of  such  a  pipe 
is  to  be  condemned  for  the  following  reasons: 

1st.  Gas  will  flow  along  the  lines  of  least  resistance. 
The  nearest  hole  will  furnish  more  gas  than  the  next  one  and 
so  on  down  the  line.  Unless  the  suction  applied  is  very 
strong  the  chances  are  that  the  bulk  of  the  gas,  if  not  all  of  it, 
will  be  drawn  through  the  first,  hole.  If  the  rate  of  gas 
suction  is  very  slow,  as  for  example,  when  a  gas  collecting 
device  is  used,  one  lone  hole  in  the  perforated  pipe  would  be 
more  than  ample  to  supply  all  of  the  gas  taken. 


86 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


2nd.  Some  of  the  small  holes  in  the  perforated  pipe  are 
quite  certain  to  be  stopped  with  soot  accumulations  and  one 
would  have  nc  means  of  knowing  when  such  stoppage  had 
occurred  nor  which  holes  had  been  affected. 

3rd.  The  velocity  of  the  gas  flow  decreases  from  the 
center  of  the  boiler  pass  toward  the  sides,  so  that  even  if  it 
were  possible  to  secure  uniformity  of  gas  flow  through  all 
of  the  perforations  in  the  tube,  the  sample  deri .  ed  would 
not  be  an  average  one.  Assuming  such  uniformity  of  flow, 
the  hole  drawing  from  the  slow  moving  gas  current  would 
supply  as  much  gas  as  the  one  drawing  from  the  fast  mo  ing 
gases.  This  would  make  the  “average”  secured  a  false  one 
and  as  the  gases  near  the  sides  of  the  boiler  carry  more  of 
an  air  excess  than  those  at  the  center,  the  sample  would  be 
rendered  falser  still. 

4th.  There  is  no  sense  in  taking  a  cross  sectional  sample 
from  side  to  side  of  the  boiler  pass  unless  you  add  to  this 
sample  another  cross-sectional  one  extending  long.tudinally 
with  the  boiler  from  baffle  to  baffle.  If  there  is  any  merit  at 
all  in  the  perforated  pipe  there  should  be  at  least  one  opening 
for  every  square  foot  of  space  throughout  a  horizontal  cross- 
section  of  the  entire  pass  of  the  boiler. 

It  is  quite  impossible  to  secure  an  absolutely  correct  aver¬ 
age  sample  of  gas  through  any  pipe  or  any  nest  of  pipes  that 
could  be  devised.  It  is  my  opinion,  and  I  base  it  upon  a  great 
deal  of  experimenting,  that  a  better  sample  can  be  secured 
through  an  ordinary  gas  pipe  opening  at  the  center  of  the  gas 
flow,  than  in  any  other  manner.  The  gases  are  reasonably 
well  mixed  when  they  arrive  at  the  exit  of  the  last  pass. 
They  have  been  tumbled  up  and  down  among  the  boiler  tubes, 
and  the  point  of  best  mixture  is  the  point  of  greatest  velocity, 
viz.,  at  the  center  of  the  gas  flow.  You  will  find  greater  varia¬ 
tions  in  the  CO2  content  of  the  gases  at  the  center  of  the  flow 
"'an  at  any  other  part  of  the  pass.  If  taking  samples  at  that 
point  you  can  tell  from  the  analysis  when  the  furnace  doors 
are  open  for  stoking,  when  an  air  hole  develops  in  the  fuel 
bed  and  what  the  exact  effect  of  the  slightest  change  in  the 
draft  may  be.  Everything  that  happens  to  affect  efficiency  is 
reported  by  the  gases  having  the  greatest  velocity,  i.  e.,  the 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


87 


gases  at  the  center  of  the  flow  and  as  you  move  away  from 
the  center  towards  the  sides  of  the  pass  or  towards  the  baffles, 
the  variations  will  be  less  and  less  pronounced  and  when  you 
reach  a  point  very  near  the  side  walls  there  will  be  prac¬ 
tically  no  variations  at  all. 

Several  years  ago  I  received  a  letter  from  the  Chief 
Engineer  of  a  cotton  mill.  He  stated  that  he  was  using  a 
perforated  sampling  pipe  and  that  he  was  unable  to  get  more 
than  2  per  cent  CO2.  I  told  him  to  throw  the  perforated 
thing  away  and  to  go  to  the  center  of  the  last  pass  with  a 
piece  of  common  pipe.  He  did  so  and  reported  13  per  cent 
CO2.  The  first  hole  in  his  perforated  pipe  had  furnished  all 
of  the  gas  and  the  gas  that  it  furnished  was  principally  air 
that  had  seeped  through  the  brick  work  of  the  setting. 

Flue  gas  analysis  as  a  means  of  determining  furnace 
efficiency  has  been  condemned  by  a  great  many  well  meaning 
engineers.  They  have  taken  the  gas  sample  from  the  uptake 
or  some  other  place,  not  the  right  one.  They  have  used  a 
perforated  tube  or  they  have  done  something  else  not  in 
accord  with  good  practice.  They  have  not  secured  results 
and  hence  they  condemn  the  whole  proposition.  I  have  yet 
to  learn  of  a  single  instance  where  satisfactory  results  in  the 
actual  reduction  of  fuel  bills  were  not  secured  when  the  right 
methods  were  followed. 

Having  learned  what  sort  of  a  sampling  pipe  to  use  and 
where  to  place  it,  the  next  step  is  to  connect  the  Gas  Analyzer 
by  means  of  its  flexible  rubber  hose  with  the  sampling  pipe. 
Drive  a  nail  into  the  brick  work  of  the  boiler  setting  or 
wherever  you  wish  to  hang  the  Analyzer  and  see  that  the 
instrument  is  at  a  proper  height  to  facilitate  ease  in  opera¬ 
tion.  Don’t  stand  it  inconveniently  on  a  box  or  a  barrel. 
You  must  work  rapidly  when  you  get  started,  because  you 
are  out  after  useful  data.  You  must  make  50  or  more  CO2 
determinations  per  hour  and  at  the  end  of  an  hour  you  ought 
to  have  the  goods  on  the  furnace  and  the  fireman. 

Your  next  step  is  to  connect  the  differential  draft  gage, 
and  I  must  digress  here  to  say  something  about  drafts  and 
draft  measurements. 

Owners  and  engineers  of  power  plants  are  frequently 


88 


Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


heard  complaining  about  the  “draft”  and  saying  all  manner 
of  unkind  things  about  the  chimney.  Most  steam  plants  suf¬ 
fer  from  too  much  draft  rather  than  from  too  little  of  it. 
If  you  have  draft  troubles  look  for  the  causes  of  them  in  the 
boiler  room  before  you  blame  the  chimney.  What  you  label 
“lack  of  stack  capacity”  may,  perhaps,  be  more  properly 
labeled  “lack  of  engineering  sagacity.”  You  probably  have 
chimney  enough  and  draft  enough.  What  you  need  is  draft 
conservation. 

By  way  of  making  clear  what  I  am  trying  to  convey  let  me 
present  an  illustration.  Let  us  suppose  a  farmer  who  wishes 
to  take  a  load  of  grain  to  market.  He  has  been  out  in  the 
field  with  a  wagon  picking  up  “nigger  heads”  and  other 
stony  impediments  to  cultivation.  He  gathers  just  about  all 
that  the  horses  can  draw  but  the  load  does  not  fill  the  wagon 
box.  He  wants  to  take  some  grain  to  market.  Being  a  lazy 
individual  and  being  in  a  hurry  to  get  to  town  and  cash  in 
on  his  grain,  he  does  not  unload  the  “nigger  heads.”  He 
piles  the  grain  in  on  top  of  them  and  of  course  he  gets  stuck 
in  a  sand  pocket  going  up  Sugar  Creek  hill.  I  submit  that 
it  would  not  be  fair  in  such  a  case  to  blame  the  horses.  The 
Society  for  the  Prevention  of  Cruelty  to  Animals  should  get 
after  the  farmer  and  a  commission  to  determine  lunacy  should 
sit  on  him.  Undoubtedly  both  of  these  things  would  happen. 

Good  engineering  is  just  good  horse  sense.  When  the 
capacity  of  either  a  horse  or  a  chimney  to  do  useful  work  is 
reduced  by  the  performance  of  useless  work,  somebody  is  not 
exercising  horse  sense. 

I  have  investigated  a  great  many  cases  where  “poor  draft” 
was  alleged  and  in  most  instances  I  have  found  the  chimney 
pulling  about  live  tons  of  “nigger  head”  ballast  for  every  ton 
of  real  cargo.  And  in  nearly  every  case  it  has  been  possible 
to  greatly  increase  the  effective  draft  by  throwing  out  the 
ballast.  In  some  cases  it  has  been  necessary  to  make  certain 
alterations  in  the  flue  connections,  but  in  very  few  cases  has 
it  been  necessary  to  do  anything  to  the  chimney  proper  beyond 
ordinary  repairs. 

We  are  told  that  it  requires  eleven  and  a  half  pounds  of 
air  to  burn  a  pound  of  “coal,”  or  around  23,000  pounds  for 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes . 


89 


each  short  ton  of  coal.  The  draft  must  raise  this  weight  to 
the  top  of  the  chimney  and  in  addition  it  must  raise  the  com¬ 
bustible  portions  of  your  coal,  for  the  oxygen  of  the  air  unites 
with  the  carbon  of  the  coal  to  form  the  gas  CO2,  and  the 
hydrogen  of  the  coal  unites  with  oxygen  to  form  water  vapor, 
H2O.  The  total  weight  that  the  draft  must,  raise  in  the  per¬ 
formance  of  useful  work  is  therefore  around  25,000  pounds  for 
each  ton  of  coal  consumed,  or  2,500,000  foot  pounds  if  your 
chimney  is  100  feet  high. 

Now  suppose  that  the  flue  gases  show  5  per  cent  CO2, 
which  in  all  probability  is  about  what  they  do  show.  This 
means  that  added  to  the  weight  of  25,000  pounds  which  the 
chimney  must  lift  there  is  an  excess  ballast  of  “nigger  heads“ 
weighing  right  at  72,220  pounds  to  be  lifted  also.  The  chim¬ 
ney  under  such  circumstances  would  be  doing  enough  work 
to  carry  three  plants  like  yours  at  full  capacity  and  with 
maximum  economy.  And  yet  the  owner  of  such  an  overworked 
and  uselessly  worked  chimney  is  persuaded  that  there  is 
something  wrong  with  it.  He  spends  a  lot  of  money  for 
more  boilers  and  chimneys  with  the  result  that  his  fuel  bills 
go  up  instead  of  down,  because  he  has  to  buy  still  more  coal 
to  heat  still  more  air. 

The  only  thing  that  draft  knows  is  to  burn  fuel  and  if 
you  have  too  much  draft  after  the  new  chimney  has  been 
built  or  after  you  have  thrown  out  the  ballast  and  given  the 
old  one  a  chance,  you  must  throttle  this  draft  as  you  throttle 
the  steam  at  the  engine.  Your  throttle  is  the  boiler  damper. 

Excess  draft  increases  your  fuel  wastes  in  several  ways. 
It  increases  the  rate  at  which  you  burn  the  coal  without  a 
commensurate  increase  in  the  rate  of  evaporation.  The  heat 
of  some  of  the  extra  coal  that  you  burn  is  nullified  by  some 
of  the  excess  air  that  is  drawn  in  by  the  excess  draft.  The 
velocity  of  the  gases  is  probably  increased  and  in  such  case 
the  boiler  has  less  time  in  which  to  absorb  the  heat  energy. 
The  stack  temperatures  are  higher.  You  lose  at  both  ends 
and  the  middle. 

A  proper  draft  gage  is  an  important  boiler  room  appliance. 
It  measures  the  actual  draft  used,  but  it  cannot  tell  you  the 
draft  that  you  ought  to  use.  It  is  like  the  scales  the  druggist 


90 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


employs.  These  tell  him  the  weights  of  the  drugs  he  is 
measuring  out,  but  they  do  not  write  prescriptions.  The  Gas 
Analyzer  prescribes  the  draft  that  should  be  employed.  The 
draft  that  will  give  you  complete  combustion  and  carry  your 
load  with  the  least  excess  of  air  is  the  draft  to  be  used  always. 
The  Gas  Analyzer  measures  the  completeness  of  combustion 
and  the  excess  of  air. 

Engineers  persist  in  connecting  their  draft  gages  at  the 
uptakes  of  their  boiler  furnaces.  In  this  case,  as  in  many 
others,  the  common  practice  is  the  wrong  practice.  Suppose 
you  wish  to  know  the  water  pressure  in  the  supply  pipes  of 
your  residence.  Where  do  you  measure  that  pressure?  Do 
you  measure  it  at  the  pumping  station  of  the  water  company 
where  it  originates  or  do  you  measure  it  at  the  faucet  in  your 
kitchen,  where  the  effective  pressure  is  expressed?  The  rate 
at  which  you  burn  your  fuel  in  the  furnace  depends  upon  the 
rate  at  which  you  apply  air  to  it,  and  this  rate,  so  far  as  a 
draft  gage  can  measure  it,  is  fixed  by  the  draft  in  the  furnace. 
The  place  to  measure  drafts,  accordingly,  is  the  boiler  fur¬ 
nace  where  the  draft  is  applied.  Of  course,  if  you  burn  your 
coal  in  the  uptake  of  the  boiler  instead  of  in  the  furnace,  it  is 
another  matter,  and  you  may  leave  your  draft  gage,  if  you 
have  one,  connected  at  the  uptake  where  it  now  is. 

The  draft  gage,  it  must  be  remembered,  does  not  measure 
gas  flow  or  gas  velocities.  It  merely  measures  differences  in 
pressure — the  pressure  of  the  atmosphere  on  the  outside  and 
the  something  less  than  atmospheric  pressure  on  the  inside  of 
the  furnace.  Under  normal  conditions,  viz.,  when  the  fires 
are  clean  and  of  uniform  thickness,  when  the  furnace  doors 
are  closed  and  the  ash-pit  doors  open,  the  draft  gage  may 
tell  us  something  about  gas  velocities — the  greater  the  draft 
the  greater  the  velocity.  Now  suppose  we  close  the  ash-pit 
doors — what  happens?  The  draft,  as  indicated  by  the  gage 
will  be  increased,  but  the  movement  of  the  gases  will  be 
decreased  because  we  have  shut  off  the  supply  of  air.  If  the 
air  is  entirely  excluded  there  will  be  no  movement  at  all  and 
hence  no  velocity  whatever.  On  the  other  hand,  if  we  open 
the  furnace  door  air  will  rush  in  and  move  with  considerable 
velocity  through  the  furnace  and  the  boiler.  But  the  gage 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


91 


will  show  that  there  is  less  draft — less  difference  in  pressure 
than  before  the  doors  were  opened.  Velocity  may  be  either 
directly  or  indirectly  proportional  to  the  draft  as  indicated 
by  a  differential  pressure  gage. 

What  causes  chimney  draft?  The  force  that  is  trying  to 

go  up  the  stack  is  stronger  than  the  force  that  is  trying  to 

come  down  the  stack.  Hence  there  is  a  movement  up  the 
stack  and  draft  is  a  “push”  and  not  a  “pull”  as  is  commonly 
supposed  and  as  its  name  implies. 

Suppose,  by  way  of  illustrating  the  physical  cause  of  draft, 
that  we  take  a  glass  tube  and  insert  it  in  a  bottle  of  oil.  By 
closing  the  tube  with  the  finger  we  can  lift  out  a  tube  full 

of  oil  Let  us  next  insert  the  oil  filled  tube  in  a  vessel  of 

water  and  remove  the  finger.  Water  will  flow  in  at  the  bottom 
of  the  tube  and  push  out  the  oil.  The  water,  in  seeking  its  level 
exerts  an  upward  pressure  in  the  bottom  of  the  tube  that  is 
greater  than  the  downward  pressure  of  the  oil.  Oil  being 
lighter  than  water  will  rise  to  the  surface  of  the  water. 

Let  us  suppose  again  that  the  oil  filled  tube  is  6  inches 
long  and  that  we  push  it  down  in  the  water  before  remov¬ 
ing  the  finger  until  the  lower  end  of  the  tube  is  3  feet  under 
water.  We  shall  then  have  a  downward  pressure  at  the 
bottom  of  the  tube  of  ...  feet  6  inches  of  water  plus  6  inches 
of  oil  and  an  upward  pressure  of  3  feet  of  water.  This 
would  make  the  net  upward  pressure  at  the  bottom  of  the  tube 
exactly  equal  the  difference  between  the  weight  of  the  oil  in 
the  tube  and  that  of  a  corresponding  6-inch  tube  full  of  water. 

Oil  is  lighter  than  water.  Hot  gas  is  lighter  than  cold 
gas.  Air  is  a  mixture  of  gases.  Your  hundred-foot  chimney 
full  of  hot  gas  stands  at  the  bottom  of  a  sea  of  air  some  50 
miles  deep.  Precisely  as  in  the  case  of  the  water  and  the  oil, 
the  net  upward  pressure  at  the  bottom  of  the  chimney  exactly 
equals  the  difference  between  the  weight  of  the  column  of 
hot  light  gas  in  the  chimney  and  that  of  a  like  column  of 
cold  heavy  air  outside  the  chimney.  And  as  the  barometric 
pressure  varies  your  draft  will  vary  also.  It  is  strange  how 
many  people  there  are  who  do  not  clearly  understand  these 
simple  draft  phenomena.  If  everybody  understood  them  there 


92 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


would  be  far  less  money  spent  for  new  chimneys  and  far 
less  kicking  about  drafts. 

“Nature  abhors  a  vacuum”  and  tries  her  best  to  destroy 
one.  There  is  a  partial  vacuum  inside  your  boiler  furnace 
and  all  the  way  from  the  furnace  to  the  top  of  the  stack. 
Nature  tries  to  destroy  that  vacuum  and  incidentally  to 
destroy  your  draft  by  shoving  cold  air  into  it,  through  the 
fuel  bed  in  the  furnace,  through  crevices  and  cracks  about 
the  furnace,  through  cracks  in  the  brick  work  of  the  setting, 
through  the  pores  of  the  bricks  themselves,  through  air  holes 
around  the  headers  at  both  ends  of  the  boiler,  through  leaks 
in  the  flue  connections  and  breeching  and  through  cracks 
and  leaks  in  the  chimney.  The  way  to  fix  nature  is  to  fix 
these  air  leaks. 

A  steel  chimney  will  radiate  more  heat  than  a  brick  or 
tile  one  and  loss  of  heat  means  loss  of  draft.  When  putting 
up  a  chimney  it  will  pay  you  to  put  up  a  little  more  money 
and  get  a  real  one.  In  the  ideal  chimney  the  temperature  at 
the  top  of  the  stack  will  closely  approximate  that  at  the  bot¬ 
tom.  The  steel  chimney  is  a  radiator  and  it  takes  the  heat  out 
of  the  gases  as  they  travel  through  it,  thereby  impairing  the 
draft  to  the  extent  of  the  heat  robbery. 

If  you  will  do  the  square  thing  by  your  chimney  and  give 
ii  a  show — forcing  it  to  perform  useful  work  only — you  will 
find  that  most  of  your  draft  trouble  has  disappeared  and  that 
the  large  expense  you  have  been  dreading  incident  to  a  new 
chimney  or  a  higher  one  may  be  avoided. 

« 

And  having  decided  to  give  your  chimney  a  fair  show  why 
not  stop  playing  favorites  with  your  boilers?  Why  do  you 
have  so  much  affection  for  the  boiler  nearest  the  stack  and  so 
little  for  the  one  farthest  from  it?  Don’t  you  know  that 
some  of  your  boilers  get  more  than  their  share  of  the  draft 
provided  by  the  chimney  and  that  others  get  less  than  their 
share  of  it?  This  isn’t  fair,  either  to  yourself  or  to  your 
boilers.  It  costs  fuel  and  adds  to  your  troubles  with  the 
smoke  inspector.  It  gives  you  as  many  combustion  problems 
as  you  have  boilers  and  furnace  drafts.  Why,  a  farmer’s  boy 
knows  enough  to  make  his  plow  horses  pull  together.  Drive 
your  boilers  the  way  the  boy  drives  his  horses.  First  find  out 


98 


How  to  “Spot”  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


Spend  your  vacation  on  the  farm  next  sum¬ 
mer  and  learn  .something'  about  steam  engi¬ 
neering. 


No 


two  of  them  pulling-  alike.  That’s  no  way  to  work  the 
horses.  It’s  just  the  way  you  work  your  boilers. 


Make  your  horses  pull  together.  Work  your  boilers  in  the 

same  manner. 


94 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


what  draft  you  ought  to  use  in  your  boiler  furnaces.  This 
draft,  as  1  have  stated,  is  the  one  that  will  produce  the  highest 
percentage  of  CO2  without  combustible  CO  and  carry  your 
load.  You  have  a  draft  gage  for  each  boiler  or  ought  to  have. 
They  are  not  expensive.  After  learning  the  draft  that  you 
ought  to  use,  you  can  equalize  the  draft  by  setting  the  indi¬ 
vidual  boiler  dampers.  I  have  known  eight  boilers  to  do  the 
work  that  ten  were  doing  before,  after  draft  equalization.  If  a 
furnace  has  too  much  draft  there  will  be  a  fuel  loss  due  to 
heating  excess  air.  If  it  has  too  little  draft  there  will  be  a  fuel 
loss  on  account  of  the  CO  which  is  due  to  a  deficiency  of  air. 

Draft  gages  are  of  great  assistance  to  the  fireman.  They 
enable  him  to  give  each  boiler  furnace  the  exact  draft  that 
it  should  have — the  standard  draft  for  the  plant,  whatever  that 
draft  may  be.  They  enable  him  to  spot  the  fire  that  is  getting 
in  bad  condition.  The  gage  will  show  an  increased  draft 
when  the  fires  are  too  thick  or  are  becoming  dirty.  It  will 
show  a  decreased  draft  when  the  fires  are  too  thin  or  when 
they  are  burning  full  of  cracks  and  holes.  The  gage  when 
properly  connected  will  show  the  draft  loss  between  the 
uptake  and  the  boiler  furnace.  If  the  loss  is  less  than  normal, 
you  will  know  that  something  has  happened  to  reduce  the 
friction  in  the  boiler  passes,  that  the  baffling  has  burned  out 
or  has  broken  down  and  that  the  gases  are  short-circuiting. 
If  the  draft  loss  is  more  than  normal  you  will  know  that 
something  has  happened  to  increase  friction,  that  there  are 
deposits  of  soot  and  ash  upon  the  tubes  and  perhaps  slag,  soot 
and  ash  accumulations  upon  the  baffles  and  the  brick  work  of 
the  setting.  These  deposits  upon  the  tubes  affect  both  the 
efficiency  and  capacity  of  the  boiler  by  resisting  the  passage 
of  heat  energy  from  the  gases  to  the  water  in  the  boiler. 
They  make  the  chimney  work  harder  to  give  the  required 
draft  to  the  furnace.  And  they  will  be  found  among  the 
chickens  that  come  home  to  roost  once  a  month  upon  the 
coal  bill. 

When  your  boiler  efficiency  refuses  to  “fish”  look  at  the 
heating  surfaces. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

HOW  TO  STOP  YOUR  FUEL  WASTES. 

It  is  one  thing  to  “spot”  a  waste  and  another  to  stop  it. 
The  apparatus  for  spotting  was  mentioned  in  the  last  chapter. 
For  stopping  the  losses  you  require  what  is  known  as  “Spiz- 
zerinktum.”  This  is  a  state  of  mind — a  mental  self-starting 
device  that  enables  you  to  get  going  without  waiting  for 
somebody  to  come  along  and  crank  up  your  motor. 

Give  the  man  who  is  loaded  with  “Spizzerinktum”  a  good 
steer  and  that  is  all  he  requires.  He  will  square  his  shoulders, 
tuck  in  his  shirt-tail  and  go  to  it.  But  the  man  who  is  not 
loaded  with  it — his  case  is  hopeless.  You  might  give  him  a 
whole  herd  of  steers  and  other  long-horned  cattle  and  it 
wouldn’t  help  him.  You  might  kick  him  in  the  gluteus 
maximus*  every  five  minutes  and  it  wouldn’t  hurry  him.  It 
takes  that  sort  of  chap  about  ten  hours  by  the  stop  watch  to 
pass  a  given  point  on  any  proposition.  “Some  men  are  slower 
than  the  wrath  of  Jehu.”*** 

Show  me  an  engineer  who  lacks  “Spizzerinktum”  and  I 
will  show  you  a  plant  so  low  down  in  the  scale  of  efficiency 
that  you  will  have  to  look  up  when  you  visit  it  to  see  bottom. 

Not  long  ago  a  plant  Manager  said  to  me,  “We  have 
bought  every  imaginable  kind  of  testing  and  recording  appa¬ 
ratus  for  our  power  department  and  none  of  it  is  used  regu¬ 
larly.  I  believe  that  considerable  might  be  accomplished  if 
our  engineer  would  take  some  interest  and  get  busy.  He  is 
always  just  going  to  turn  things  upside  down,  but  he  never 
gets  started.”  There  is  only  one  thing  to  do  with  that  kind 
of  a  man.  Tie  a  can  to  him  and  send  him  down  south  of  the 
Rio  Grande  into  the  “manana”**  country  to  herd  with  the 
Greasers. 

Men  who  are  accustomed  to  visiting  power  plants  will 
tell  you  that  the  reason  most  plants  are  so  low  in  efficiency 
is  that  the  men  in  charge  of  them  and  the  men  back  of  the 
men  in  charge  lack  “Spizzerinktum.” 

♦Latin  for  “caboose." 

♦♦Mexican  for  “watchful  waiting." 

***R.  B.  Whitacre. 


96 


Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


We  will  now  get  busy  with  the  “spotting”  apparatus 
mentioned  in  the  last  chapter. 

The  manufacturer  of  whom  you  purchased  your  draft 
gages  has  surely  provided  you  with  explicit  directions  for 
connecting  the  gages  with  the  boiler  furnaces.  If  he  has  not 
done  so  he  ought  not  to  be  in  the  business  of  making  gages. 
We  will  assume  that  the  gage  is  properly  connected  and  that 
everything  is  ready.  We  will  assume  also  that  the  boiler  to 
be  tested  is  one  of  the  “B.  &  W.”  type. 


Differential  Draft  Gage  (Designed  by  the  Author) 

N.  B.  IT  IS  NECESSARY,  IN  THE  PAGES  THAT  FOLLOW, 
TO  ILLUSTRATE  SOME  OF  THE  APPARATUS  REQUIRED  IN 
MAKING  COMBUSTION  TESTS.  ALL  OF  THE  APPARATUS 
ILLUSTRATED  WAS  DESIGNED  BY  THE  AUTHOR  AND  IN 
SHOWING  IT  HE  DOES  NOT  INTEND  NOR  DESIRE  TO 
DISPARAGE  ANY  OTHER  APPARATUS  OF  SIMILAR  CHAR¬ 
ACTER. 

You  shove  the  gas  pipe,  selected  in  Chapter  II,  through 
the  top  blow  hole  of  the  last  pass  of  the  boiler  and  I  ask  you 
as  you  do  so  to  note  whether  the  pipe  has  the  “feel”  of  con¬ 
tacting  with  clean  metal  or  with  something  that  is  soft 
and  dirty. 

I  was  talking  one  time  with  the  engineer  of  a  very  mod¬ 
ern  power  plant  in  the  very  modern  city  of  Minneapolis.  We 
got  around  to  soot  and  the  engineer  said,  “I  will  show  you 
that  we  keep  our  boiler  tubes  clean.”  He  raised  the  slide 
over  one  of  the  blow  holes  at  the  first  pass  of  the  boiler. 
There  was  a  good  light  from  the  furnace  just  below  the  tubes 


How  to  Stop  Youi ’  Fuel  Wastes. 


97 


and  we  had  a  fair  view  of  them.  They  were  reasonably 
clean.  We  then  went  to  the  back  pass  of  the  boiler,  but  there 
was  no  light  from  the  furnace  there  and  we  could  not  see 
anything.  I  asked  for  an  electric  flash  light  and  the  engineer 
said  that  he  could  steal  one  “off”  the  night  watchman.  While 
he  was  gone  in  search  of  it  I  found  a  piece  of  gas  pipe  about 
six  feet  long  and  thrust  this  through  each  of  the  blow  holes 
of  the  last  pass  and  across  the  tubes  of  the  boiler.  I  could 
tell  from  the  “feel”  of  the  pipe  that  there  was  a  surprise  in 
store  for  my  engineer  friend.  His  flash  light  showed  furrows 
an  inch  deep  in  soot  where  I  had  plowed  with  the  gas  pipe 
across  the  tops  of  the  tubes. 

Now  it  was  evident  that  the  man  who  had  blown  those 
tubes  had  not  finished  the  job.  He  had  blown  the  soot 
from  the  first  pass  back  into  the  second  pass  and  the  double 
dose  of  soot  from  there  back  into  the  third.  Then  he  had 
stopped  to  rest,  or  to  look  at  a  dog  fight,  or  to  visit  the  can* 
or  for  some  other  purpose.  At  any  rate,  he  had  not  finished  his 
work.  Now  if  things  like  that  can  happen  in  well  regulated 
plants  what  can  we  expect  to  find  in  plants  that  are  not 
regulated  at  all? 

I  have  seen  boiler  tubes  entirely  covered  with  soot,  so 
thick  in  places  that  the  spaces  between  the  tubes  were  actually 
bridged  over.  And  the  boiler  room  men  really  went  through 
the  motions  from  time  to  time  of  blowing  the  soot  from  the 
tubes.  They  didn’t  do  the  job  properly  at  any  time.  Prob¬ 
ably  the  nasty  features  of  the  work  had  something  to  do 
with  the  slovenliness  of  its  performance.  To  clean  off  soot 
properly  all  of  it  should  be  blown  off  all  of  the  tubes.  To 
blow  it  from  one  locality  to  another  doesn’t  help  much.  It 
is  no  uncommon  thing  to  find  soot  so  thickly  packed  into  the 
corners  and  along  the  side  walls  of  water  tube  boilers  that 
you  could  use  a  hoe  and  shovel  in  removing  it. 

In  non-conducting  properties,  soot  has  been  proved  to  be 
five  times  as  effective  as  fine  asbestos.  It  is  one  of  the  most 
effective  of  all  known  non-conductors.  You  want  your  boiler 
tubes  to  conduct  heat  as  rapidly  as  possible  to  the  water 


♦Water  bucket. 


98 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


•  7  -  #  _ 

within  the  tubes.  If  you  want  to  keep  up  steam  when  the  soot 
piles  up  you  will  have  to  pile  in  more  coal. 

And  don’t  think  for  a  moment  that  there  is  no  occasion 
to  use  your  soot  blower  because  you  make  no  smoke.  If 
your  furnaces  never  smoke  at  all  there  can  be  little,  if  any, 
soot  upon  the  tubes,  but  there  can  be  a  great  deal  of  fine 
ash,  even  from  anthracite  coal.  Do  you  know  how  much  fine 
ash  was  removed  from  the  combustion  chambers  of  your 
boilers  the  last  time  they  were  cleaned?  There  were  wagon 
loads  of  it,  most  likely.  Every  bit  of  it  was  carried  over  from 
the  furnace  by  the  gases.  And  if  that  quantity  of  ash  was 
carried  through  the  tubes  it  is  reasonable  to  presume  that 
some  of  it  landed  on  the  tubes. 

If  you  are  fixed  to  blow  the  tubes  economically  by  a  per¬ 
manent  installation  of  blowers,  don’t  be  scared  of  blowing 
them  too  frequently.  Two  or  three  times  a  day  will  be  none 
too  often.  Whenever  you  see  smoke  coming  from  your  chim¬ 
ney,  think  of  the  deposit  it  is  leaving  upon  the  tubes.  There 
is  mighty  little  of  real  fuel  value  in  black  smoke,  probably 
not  to  exceed  2  per  cent  of  the  fuel  at  the  extreme  figure  in 
the  extremest  smoke.  This  has  been  proved  many  tims  by 
the  use  of  soot  traps  and  by  analysis  of  the  smoke.  And  yet 
the  smoke  may  cause  a  loss  of  many  times  2  per  cent.  The 
loss  is  not  in  the  soot  that  goes  up  the  chimney.  It  is  in  the 
soot  that  sticks  to  the  tubes  and  does  not  go  up  the  chimney. 

.  And  a  bad  thing  about  soot  on  the  tubes  is  that  if  you  do 
not  get  it  off  it  is  liable  to  bake  there  and  if  this  happens 
very  serious  trouble  may  result.  I  recall  one  case  of  a  return 
tubular  boiler  that  will  serve  as  an  example  of  carbonaceous 
scale.  There  was  almost  a  quarter  of  an  inch  of  it  baked  on 
the  tubes.  On  reaming  out  one  of  the  tubes  a  leak  was 
developed  and  the  boiler  inspector  condemned  all  of  the  tubes. 
The  leak  was  due  to  the  corrosive  action  of  the  sulphur  baked 
on  with  the  soot.  When  the  tubes  were  removed  the  majority 
of  them  were  found  to  be  pitted. 

Air  leaks  about  boiler  settings  get  on  my  nerves  because 
there  is  no  excuse  whatever  for  them.  You  do  not  have  to 
be  told  that  they  are  bad  for  efficiency.  Soot  gets  on  my 
nerves  for  the  same  reason. 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


Of  course,  if  you  want  soot,  why,  suit  yourself.  And  help 
yourself  liberally  to  it.  There  is  plenty  of  it. 

Before  you  start  work  with  the  Gas  Analyzer  get  a  piece 
of  chalk  and  a  foot  rule  and  borrow  the  fireman’s  wide-bladed 
hoe.  Chalk  a  scale  in  inches  on  the  hoe  blade.  You  can  then 
set  the  hoe  blade  up  on  edge  on  the  furnace  grates  and  tell 
exactly  how  thick  the  fuel  may  be  on  the  grates.  Next  havfe 
the  engineer  draw  a  sample  of  gas  and  determine  the  per- 


Showing  about  how  the  temperatures 
drop  in  the  boiler  passes  when  the 
heating  surfaces  are  clean. 


The  only  heat  that 
counts  is  the  heat 
that  gets  into  the 

WATER 


100  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


centage  of  CO2.  While  he  is  pumping  the  gas  sample,  read 
the  draft  gage  and  while  he  is  analyzing  the  sample,  look  in 
the  furnace  and  note  the  conditioq  of  the  “fire,”  especially  as 
regards  the  state  of  the  fuel  on  the  grates.  Make  a  careful 
memorandum  of  whatever  you  see  and  note  especially  whether 
the  coal  is  evenly  distributed  or  all  “hills  and  hollows.” 
And  look  for  cracks  and  thin  places  in  the  fuel  bed.  And  don’t 
forget  to  look  in  the  corners  at  the  front  of  the  furnace.  You 
may  find  bare  spots  there  and  you  are  almost  sure  to  find 
one  just  back  of  the  brick  work  between  the  furnace  doors.  It 
is  a  .little  difficult  to  get  fuel  on  these  places  because  it  is 
hard  to  throw  coal  around  a  corner  and  the  fireman  is  likely 
to  slide  over  anything  that  is  hard  to  do. 

If  it  is  a  stoker  instead  of  a  hand-fired  furnace  you  will 
make  the  same  sort  of  observation  to  detect  air  leaks.  Instead 
of  looking  for  air  leaks  in  the  corners  you  will  look  in  the 
hoppers  and  instead  of  looking  through  the  furnace  door  you 
will  look  through  the  observation  door.  Everything  that  I  am 
saying  about  hand-fired  furnaces  applies  in  one  way  or  another 
to  automatic  stokers.  The  stoker  has  this  advantage  among 
others  over  a  hand-fired  furnace — you  do  not  have  to  open 
the  furnace  door  and  let  in  a  lot  of  cold  air  when  you  are 
putting  in  the  coal.  The  hand-fired  furnace  has  this  advan¬ 
tage  over  the  stoker:  When  the  fire  needs  anything  you  can 
see  what  it  needs  and  where  it  needs  it  and  you  can  give  it 
what  it  needs.  If  the  boilers  are  set  in  battery,  guess  work 
must  very  largely  prevail  in  looking  after  the  stokers.  The 
stoker  requires  attention  the  same  as  the  hand-fired  furnace 
and  it  requires  a  higher  order  of  intelligence.  Of  course,  there 
are  stokers  and  stokers,  but  whatever  type  of  stoker  you  may 
have  you  must  not  make  the  mistake  of  thinking  that  it  will 
take  care  of  itself.  One  of  the  most  efficient  plants  I  ever  saw 
was  hand-fired  and  one  of  the  most  wasteful  was  stoker-fired. 
If  you  will  permit  me  to  pick  the  stoker  and  the  stoker  attend¬ 
ant  I  will  back  the  machine  against  hand-firing. 

Furnace  efficiency  depends  upon  little  things  and  many 
of  them.  One  little  thing  may  not  mean  much,  but  many  of 
them  mean  a  waste  of  one-quarter  of  your  fuel.  There  is  no 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


101 


place  to  draw  the  line  on  these  little  things.  You  must 
observe  all  of  them. 

Now,  if  when  inspecting  conditions  in  the  furnace,  you 
find  that  the  coal  is  evenly  distributed,  set  up  the  hoe  that 
you  have  calibrated  and  determine  the  thickness  of  the  fuel 
bed.  Do  this  from  time  to  time  as  the  test  proceeds.  If 
the  coal  is  not  evenly  distributed,  you  cannot,  of  course, 
measure  the  fuel  thickness. 

While  you  have  been  inspecting  the  furnace  the  engineer 
has  been  analyzing  and  he  now  reports,  let  us  say,  5  per 
cent  CO2.  Before  you  proceed  further  be  dead  sure  that  the 
gas  sample  was  properly  taken.  Is  the  open  end  of  the  gas 
pipe  at  the  center  of  the  gas  flow  in  the  last  pass?  You  know 
how  the  baffles  are  arranged  in  the  boiler  and  where  they 
are  located.  You  can  judge  about  how  the  gases  will  flow 
from  the  bottom  of  the  last  baffle  to  the  gas  exit  from  the 
boiler.  You  can  find  the  approximate  center  of  the  gas  flow, 
if  you  are  uncertain  about  it,  by  probing  for  it  with  the  gas 
pipe  and  working  the  Analyzer.  The  center  is  the  place  where 
you  get  the  highest  CO2  and  the  most  pronounced  fluctuations 
in  the  percentages.  If  you  get  uniformly  low  percentages 
and  there  are  no  marked  changes  when  the  furnace  doors  are 
opened  and  closed,  it  may  be  that  the  baffling  has  broken 
down  or  some  other  abnormal  circumstance  has  short-cir¬ 
cuited  the  gas  currents  out  of  their  normal  channels. 

Now,  what  does  this  5  per  cent  CO2  mean?  And  why  are 
we  getting  5  per  cent  instead  of  14  or  15? 

The  COo  percentage  indicates  the  volume  of  excess  air 
flowing  through  the  furnace,  and  the  passes  of  the  boiler — 
the  ratio  between  the  air  that  is  taken  for  a  useful  purpose 
in  burning  the  coal  and  that  which  is  taken  to  the  wasteful 
end  of  cooling  the  furnace  gases.  That  is  all  that  it  does 
indicate  and  its  indications  are  only  approximations.  We 
might  determine  the  air  excess  much  more  accurately  by  find¬ 
ing  the  percentage  of  free  Oxygen  with  the  Gas  Analyzer. 
The  objection  to  the  Oxygen  analysis  is  that  it  takes  time 
and  we  do  not  have  the  time  for  it.  We  want  data  and  I 
have  already  shown  how  essential  speed  is  to  securing  that 
data.  Some  of  it  will  get  away  from  us  if  we  do  not  work 


1Q2  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


the  Analyzer  about  once  a  minute.  It  will  take  five  minutes 
to  determine  the  Oxygen.  When  you  work  the  CO2  per¬ 
centage  up  to  12  or  15  it  will  be  time  enough  to  analyze  for 
Oxygen  and  CO.  Don’t  spend  a  minute  on  those  gases  until 
you  do. 

'  i  Why  does  the  CO ■>  percentage  indicate  the  excess  air? 

The  air  normally  carries  about  20.7  per  cent  Oxygen  by 
volume.  When  Oxygen  combines  with  Carbon  in  the  reaction 
of  combustion,  both  the  Oxygen  and  the  Carbon  disappear  as 
such.  The  solid  Carbon  unites  with  the  gas,  Oxygen,  and 
another  gas  results  which  the  chemist  has  labeled  “CO2.” 
He  resorts  to  the  formula  because  it  tells  him  precisely  of 
what  the  gas  is  composed — that  it  is  one  part  Carbon  (C), 
and  two  parts  Oxygen  (O2).  And  moreover,  the  chemist  is 
too  blamed  lazy  to  write  out  the  full  name  of  the  gas,  “Carbon 
Dioxide.” 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  when  we  take  a  given  volume  of 
Oxygen  and  add  to  it  a  given  bulk  of  coal,  Carbon,  to  form 
CO2,  the  resulting  gas  exactly  equals  the  volume  of  the 
original  Oxygen.  Here  is  a  case  where  we  can  take  a  pail 
full  of  fluid  and  add  a  solid  to  it  without  overflowing  the 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


103 


pail.  I  must  ask  you  to  accept  this  established  fact  as  “gos¬ 
pel’’  because  the  space  is  lacking  to  explain  it. 

Now,  remembering  that  the  air  contains  20.7  per  cent 
Oxygen,  let  us  consider  an  illustration: 

Suppose  we  have  a  quart  of  milk  that  is  20.7  per  cent 
cream.  We  add  a  quart  of  water  and  our  two  quart  mixture 
is  10.35  per  cent  cream.  There  is  the  same  quantity  of  cream 
as  in  the  first  instance,  but  the  diluting  water  reduces  the 
percentage  of  the  cream  in  terms  of  the  total  milk  and  water 
mixture.  If  we  add  two  more  quarts  of  water,  giving  us  four 
quarts  of  weak  milk  in  all,  the  mixture  will  be  5.175  per  cent 
cream.  The  water  excess  would  be  three  times  the  original 


milk  and  cream  volume,  or  300  per  cent.  If  you  do  not  under¬ 
stand  this  thing  your  milkman  will  explain  it  to  you.  Dou¬ 
bling  the  air  supply  works  the  same  mathematics  on  CO2  that 
doubling  the  water  added  works  011  cream. 

It  should  now  be  understood  why  the  lower  we  go  in 
the  scale  of  CO 2  the  greater  will  be  the  waste  that  the  drop 
of  each  succeeding  per  cent  indicates.  For  example,  if  we 
drop  from  16  per  cent  CO2  to  10  per  cent,  the  loss  due  to  this 
drop  of  6  per  cent  will  be  around  6  per  cent  in  fuel,  while  the 
loss  in  dropping  from  10  per  cent  to  6  per  cent  is  near  12  per 
Cent  in  fuel,  and  in  dropping  from  6  per  cent  to  2  per  cent 
the  loss  is  57  per  cent  of  the  fuel.  Theoretically  the  loss 
becomes  total  at  1.5  per  cent  CO2,  the  volume  of  excess  air 
heated  being  then  so  great  that  it  would  be  impossible  to 
boil  the  water  in  the  boiler.  The  charts  and  tables  presented 


104  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


will  show  the  COo  and  excess  air  relations  in  a  more  graphic 
and  detailed  manner. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  all  such  charts  and  tables 
are  based  upon  an  assumed  set  of  conditions.  In  the  present 
instance  the  fuel  is  assumed  to  be  pure  Carbon,  which  fuel 
never  is,  and  the  stack  temperatures  are  assumed  to  be  con¬ 
stant  at  500  deg.  Fahr.,  which  they  never  are.  The  higher 
the  stack  temperatures  the  hotter  we  are  heating  the  excess 
air  and  the  hotter  we  make  it  the  more  fuel  we  are  wasting. 

It  is  not  pretended  that  any  engineer  can  actually  com¬ 
pute  his  gains  and  losses  from  the  table  submitted  or  that 
the  figures  given  indicate  the  excess  air  in  any  instance.  As 
stated,  the  table  applies  to  pure  Carbon  only.  With  such 
fuel  the  theoretical  CO2  would  be  20.7  per  cent  by  volume. 
When  a  bituminous  coal  is  burned  the  theoretical  CO2  will 
be  less,  depending  upon  the  percentage  of  Hydrogen  in  the 
combustible,  probably  somewhere  between  17  and  19  per 
cent,  as  against  20.7  per  cent.* 

The  fuel  waste  in  your  plant  may  be  more  or  less  than 
the  figures  given  in  the  table,  but  it  will  not  be  very  far  from 
them.  They  will  serve  as  a  sufficiently  accurate  guide  for  all 
practical  purposes  and  you  may,  if  you  wish,  base  a  bonus 
system  upon  them  and  reward  your  firemen  according  to 
their  CO2  charts. 

Instead  of  presenting  many  tables  applying  to  many  coals, 
I  therefore  present  but  one,  and  it,  as  I  have  stated,  applies 
to  straight  Carbon. 

I  could  not  give  you  a  table  that  would  exactly  apply  to 
your  coal  because  I  do  not  know  what  coal  you  are  burning 
and,  lacking  an  analysis  showing  the  relative  percentages  of 
Carbon,  Hydrogen  and  Sulphur,  I  could  not  give  you  a  table 
even  if  I  knew  the  origin  of  the  coal.  And  even  if  you  con¬ 
tract  for  coal  of  a  definite.  B.  t.  u.  value  and  definite  ash 
content,  you  will  not  know  short  of  a  daily  coal  analysis 
whether  you  are  or  are  not  getting  the  coal  for  which  you 
contracted.  When  you  adopt  the  modern  method  of  paying  for 
heat  units  instead  of  for  fuel  by  the  ton  you  will  come  nearer 

*See  the  charts  in  the  Appendix  relating  to  bituminous 
coal,  fuel  oil  and  gas. 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


105 


getting  what  you  pay  for.  Until  you  do  adopt  that  method, 
you  can  just  roll  up  your,  pious  eyes  when  you  see  the  coal 
wagon  coming  and  pray  that  there  may  be  a  few  heat  units 
in  it. 

The  table  assumes  the  fuel  to  be  pure  Carbon  and  that 
the  temperature  of  the  escaping  gases  is  constant  at  500  deg. 
Fahrenheit.  On  this  assumption  the  loss  would  become  total 
at  a  fraction  above  1.5  per  cent  COo.  The  table  also  assumes 
the  entire  absence  of  CO. 


COo  AND  FUEL  LOSSES. 


Pet.  Pre- 

Pet.  Pre- 

Pet.  Pre- 

ventable 

ventable 

ventable 

Pet. 

Fuel 

Pet. 

Fuel 

Pet. 

Fuel 

C02 

Loss 

COo 

Loss 

COo 

Loss 

15.  .. 

. 0.0 

10.0.  .  . 

.  5.69 

5.0.  .  . 

. 22.79 

14.8.  . 

. 0.148 

9.8.  .  . 

.  6.04 

4.8.  .  . 

. 24.21 

14.6. . 

. 0.305 

9.6.  .  . 

.  6.40 

4.6.  .  . 

. 25.76 

14.4.  . 

. 0.470 

9.4.  .  . 

.  6.78 

4.4.  .  . 

. 27.44 

14.2.  . 

. 0.635 

9.2.  . 

.  7.18 

4.2.  .. 

. 29.29 

14.0.  . 

. 0.808 

9.0.  .  . 

.  7.58 

4.0.  .  . 

. 31.28 

13.8. . 

. 0.990 

8.8.  .  . 

.  8.02 

3.8.  .. , 

. 33.58 

13.6.  . 

. 1.17 

8.6. .  . 

.  8.47 

3.6.  .  . 

. 36.08 

13.4.  . 

. 1.36 

8.4.  .  . 

. 8.95 

3.4.  .  . 

. 38.87 

13.2. . 

8.2.  .  . 

.  9.44 

3.2. .  . 

. 42.01 

13.0.  . 

. 1.75 

8.0.  .  . 

.  9.66 

3.0.  .  . 

. 45.28 

12.8.  . 

. 1.95 

7.8.  . . 

. 10.51 

2.8.  .  . 

. 49.64 

12.6.  . 

. 2.16 

7.6.  .  . 

. 11.09 

2.6.  .  . 

. 54.34 

12.4.  . 

. 2.38 

7.4.  .  . 

. 11.70 

2.4.  .  . 

. 60.32 

12.2. . 

. 2.60 

7.2.  .  . 

. 12.34 

2.2.  .  . 

. 66.30 

12.0.  . 

. 2.84 

7.0.  .  . 

. 13.02 

2.0.  .  . 

. 74.00 

11.8.  . 

. 3.08 

6.8. .  . 

. 13.74 

1.8.  .  . 

. 83.56 

11.6.  . 

. 3.33 

6.6.  .  . 

. 14.49 

1.6. .  . 

. 95.45 

11.4.  . 

. 3.59 

6.4.  .  . 

. 15.30 

1.4 

11.2.  . 

. 3.86 

6.2.  .  . 

. 16.16 

1.2 

11.0.  . 

. 4.13 

6.0.  .  . 

. 17.09 

1.0 

10.8. . 

. 4.43 

5.8.  .  . 

. 18.06 

.8 

10.6.  . 

. 4.72 

5.6.  .  . 

. 19.12 

.6 

10.4.  . 

. 5.03 

5.4.  .  . 

. 20.25 

.4 

10.2.  . 

. 5.35 

5.2..  . 

. 21.47 

.2 

106  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


It  is  plain  that  the  temperature  would  not  remain  constant 
— that  it  would  decrease  both  at  the  furnace  and  the  exit  of  the 
boiler  with  the  decrease  in  COo.  While  the  fall  in  temperature 
would  affect  the  table,  it  may  be  stated  that  the  figures  given 
will  very  closely  apply  in  actual  practice  where  the  fuel  used 
is  a  low  volatile,  high  carbon  coal. 

The  table  further  assumes  that  15  per  cent  CO2  is  the 
limit  beyond  which  it  is  not  safe  to  go  in  good  practice. 
There  is  a  loss  of  3.1  per  cent  due  to  excess  air  between  15 
per  cent  and  the  theoretical  limit  of  20.7  per  cent  CO2,  which 
the  author  has  presumed  to  figure  as  non-preventable. 


COo  and  AIR  EXCESS. 


Pet.  C02. 

Pet.  Air  Excess. 

Pet.  CO2. 

Pet.  Air 

15 

38. 

6 

245 

14 

47.8 

5 

314 

13 

59.2 

4 

417 

12 

72.5 

*) 

O 

590 

11 

88.1 

.  2 

935 

10 

107. 

1 

1970 

9 

130. 

8 

158.7 

rr 

i 

195.7 

To  determine  the  percentage  of  excess  air  for  any  given 
percentage  of  CO2,  as  for  example,  5.4  per  cent,  proceed  as 
follows: 

Subtract  the  observed  percentage  (in  this  case  5.4)  from 
20.7,  divide  the  remainder  by  the  observed  percentage  and 
multiply  by  100.  This  gives  the  volume  of  excess  air.  At 
5.4  per  cent  CO2  the  excess  air  is  283.33  per  cent.  In  rough 
figures  the  preventable  fuel  waste  may  be  computed  by  allow¬ 
ing  1  per  cent  of  fuel  loss  for  each  12  per  cent  of  air  excess 
above  38  per  cent.  This  figure  is  quite  as  accurate  as  the  one 
commonly  applied  to  feed  water,  viz., "I  per  cent  of  the  fuel 
lost  or  gained  for  a  change  of  temperature  in  the  feed  water 
of  10  degrees. 

But  to  return  to  the  specific  problems  before  us  in  testing 
the  gases  from  your  furnace  and  “B.  &  W.”  boiler. 

What  did  the  5  per  cent  CO2  mean?  -  ... 

It  meant  that  you  were  heating  314  per  cent  excess  air 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes 


107 


Curves  showing  the  relations  between  COo  Furnace  Temperatures,  Excess  Air  and  Fuel  Loss 


108  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency 


and  that  you  were  uselessly  wasting  22.79  per  cent  of  your 
fuel;  that  for  every  100  cubic  feet  of  air  that  you  were  using 
to  burn  the  coal  you  were  taking  in  and  heating  to  the  tem¬ 
perature  of  the  uptake  gases  an  additional  314  cubic  feet. 
You  were  using  in  one  boiler  furnace  almost  enough  air  to 
operate  three  of  them. 

Now,  if  we  can  find  why  and  where  the  excess  air  is 
getting  in,  we  will  know  the  exact  reason  for  the  fuel  waste 
and  we  can  devise  a  remedy.  The  draft  gage  says  that  there 
is  a  negative  pressure,  or  a  “draft”  of  21  hundredths  of  an 
inch  over  the  fire  in  the  furnace.  I  am  just  assuming  that 
draft  for  the  purpose  of  the  illustration.  The  draft  might  be 
anything. 

We  now  turn  to  the  fireman,  the  favored  fellow  who  is 
trusted  to  handle  your  money  with  a  scoop  shovel.  He  has 
been  making  steam  without  thinking.  We  must  wind  up  his 
“think”  clock  and  set  it  ticking. 

He  has  been  putting  some  more  coal  on  the  fire  and  we 
catch  him  in  the  act  of  closing  the  furnace  door.  We  say 
to  him : 

“Why  did  you  shut  the  furnace  door?  Why  not  leave  it 
open?  Why  not  take  the  thing  off  altogether  and  sell  it  for 
old  iron?  Every  time  you  close  the  door  you  have  to  open  it 
again.  This  takes  time  and  means  work  and  may  burn  your 
fingers.” 

The  fireman  looks  at  us  quizzically.  He  thinks  we  are 
joking  him.  We  press  him  for  an  answer  and  he  delivers  a 
pointed  lecture  on  the  economies  of  combuston. 

“Do  you  see  that  steam  gage  up  there?”  he  asks  us.  “Well, 
it  is  my  business  to  keep  the  arrow  pointing  at  100  pounds. 
How  long  could  I  hold  steam  if  I  did  not  close  the  door? 
The  cold  air  would  rush  in  and  cool  off  the  furnace.  Every¬ 
body  knows  that.  Sure,  you  must  be  ‘joshing’  me  to  ask  such 
a  fool  question.” 

And  so  we  see  that  the  fireman  knows  about  the  damaging 
effects  of  cold  air.  The  trouble  with  the  fireman  is  that 
he  does  not  continue  his  line  of  thinking  and  apply  his  cold 
air  theories  to  the  thin  places  and  the  holes  in  his  fire. 

We  explain  to  him  that  the  Gas  Analyzer  is  an  instru- 


Tn  making  a  study  of  the  kind  under  discussion,  be  graphic  form  the  relations  you  are  seeking  to  dis 
Drafts  and  Fuel  thicknesses.  These  will  show  in  sure  to  preserve  the  data.  Plot  curves  for  the  CO 
cover. 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes.  109 


REYNOLDS -LYLE  COMPANY 


110  Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

ment  for  measuring  the  cold  air  that  is  going  through  his 
furnace  and  he  immediately  understands  what  the  curious 
looking  thing,  that  he  has  been  eyeing  with  suspicion,  has 
to  do  with  his  work.  We  now  call  his  attention  to  the  cracks 
and  holes  in  the  fuel  bed  and  force  him  to  admit  that  cold 
air  is  flowing  through  them,  also  that  the  cold  air  so  taken 
is  just  as  damaging  to  steam  and  efficiency  as  the  cold  air 
that  flows  through  the  open  fire  door.  We  ask  him  to  take  a 
light  rake  and  level  off  the  fuel.  To  do  so  he  must  break  up 
the  islands  of  coke  and  close  the  cracks  and  air  holes.  When 
he  has  finished  we  take  the  “calibrated”  fire  hoe  and  discover 
that  the  “fire”  is  four  inches  thick.  We  also  note  that  stopping 
the  air  leaks  has  jumped  the  draft  from  21  hundredths  of  an 
inch  to  something  higher,  say  30  hundredths.  We  try  the  Gas 
Analyzer  at  once  and  it  reports  7  per  cent  CO2.  Referring 
to  the  table  above  we  find  that  the  air  excess  has  been  reduced 
from  314  per  cent  to  195.7  per  cent.  Subtracting  the  last  figure 
from  the  first  one  we  find  that  we  stopped  an  air  excess  of 
118.3  per  cent  by  raking  the  fire  and  closing  the  cracks.  We 
reduced  the  fuel  loss  from  22.79  per  cent  to  13.02  per  cent. 
We  take  great  pains  to  explain  this  to  the  fireman  and  we 
make  him  admit  that  the  fire  is  now  in  better  condition  than 
before  he  raked  it. 

The  Analyzer  has  told  us  that  we  are  on  the  right  track 
but  that  we  still  have  some  distance  to  travel.  There  are  no 
cracks  in  the  fuel  now,  but  we  are  not  getting  enough  CCK 
Possibly  the  fuel  is  a  little  thin  for  the  draft  that  is  being 
applied  to  it.  The  thinner  the  fuel  the  easier  it  is  for  the 
draft  to  pull  excess  air  through  it.  On  this  assumption  we 
have  the  fireman  thicken  the  fuel  bed  gradually,  measuring 
it  at  intervals  with  the  hoe.  We  get  as  high  as  8  per  cent 
CO2  and  there  we  stick.  We  have  a  “peach”  of  a  fire  but  we 
connot  push  the  air  excess  any  lower. 

We  next  move  the  gas  pipe  sampling  tube  to  the  middle 
blow  hole  of  the  first  pass  of  the  boiler  and  take  a  sample. 
We  must  grab  this  sample  very  quickly  because  when  the 
tube  is  heated  to  an  oxidizing  state  it  will  take  oxygen 
from  the  gases  we  are  pumping  through  it  and  this  will 
affect  the  result  of  our  analysis.  We  find  14  per  cent  CO 2, 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


Ill 


under  the  same  furnace  conditions  that  had  been  giving  us 
8  per  cent  at  the  last  pass  of  the  boiler.  There  is  a  thun¬ 
dering  leakage  of  air  between  the  first  sampling  point  and 
the  last  one — 110.9  per  cent.  We  now  go  after  that  boiler 
setting  with  the  candles.  We  find  leaks  at  all  of  the  localities 
suggested  in  the  previous  chapters.  The  leaks  about  the 
headers  into  the  first  pass  are  particularly  serious.  We  get 
none  of  this  last  mentioned  leakage  when  sampling  from  the 
first  pass  because  the  sampling  tube  was  toward  the  rear  of 
the  pass  and  the  cold  air  was  flowing  in  at  the  front  of  the 
pass.  It  did  not  mix  with  the  gases  until  the  second  pass  was 
reached.  We  got  the  full  returns  from  it  in  the  last  pass, 
together  with  that  of  all  the  rest  of  the  air  leakage  about  the 
boiler  setting,  which  the  candles  tell  us  must  be  considerable. 

We  go  after  these  air  leaks  now  with  an  understanding  of 
what  they  really  mean  to  efficiency  and  we  keep  after  them 
until  two  snap-shot  gas  samples,  taken  one  at  each  of  the 
extreme  boiler  passes  with  the  least  possible  intervening- 
time  ,  show  the  same  percentage  of  COi>.  When  you  learn 
how  rapidly  the  gases  change  within  certain  limits  you  will 
understand  why  speed  in  the  operation  of  the  Analyzer  is 
necessary  if  you  wish  to  accumulate  data. 

When  we  know  that  the  setting  is  properly  tight  it  will 
be  just  a  question  of  pursuing  the  study  until  we  find  the 
exact  conditions  of  draft,  fuel  thickness,  etc.,  that  will  yield 
from  14  to  15  per  cent  CO2.  When  we  find  these  conditions 
we  have  “arrived”  and  it  is  just  a  question  of  keeping  at  it 
until  we  do  find  them.  The  process  of  finding  is  one  of 
“cutting  and  fitting  and  trying.” 

A  few  years  ago  a  committee  was  appointed  by  an 
engineering  society  to  investigate  CO2  Recorders.  It  re¬ 
ported  adversely  and  cited  the  fact  that  an  increase  in  CO 2 
was  usually  followed  by  a  rise  in  stack  temperatures.  Hence 
it  reasoned  that,  high  CO2  did  not  indicate  efficiency,  but  the 
contrary,  and  that  all  “CO2  Apparatus”  was  to  be  avoided  as 
promoting  waste  rather  than  efficiency. 

The  “Chimney  Waste”  cannot  be  determined  from  the 
uptake  temperatures  alone  nor  from  those  temperatures  con¬ 
sidered  in  relation  to  the  initial  furnace  temperatures.  The 


112  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


pyrometer  does  not  count  heat  units.  It  measures  intensity 
without  regard  to  quantity.  A  pint  of  water  at  the  boiling 
point  contains  far  less  heat  than  a  barrel  of  water  at  a  far 
lower  temperature.  And  so  as  regards  chimney  temperatures 
it  makes  a  lot  of  difference  whether  the  pyrometer  is  report¬ 
ing  on  a  pint  of  gas  or  a  barrel  of  it.  The  heat  loss  in  the 
uptake  is  determined  by  multiplying  the  temperature  into  the 
quantity  of  air  and  gases  heated.  You  can  stand  a  reasonable 
increase  in  uptake  temperatures  as  you  rise  in  the  CO2  scale 
because  you  are  reducing  the  quantity  heated  faster  than  you 
are  increasing  the  temperature. 

A  Chicago  engineer  complained  that  he  could  not  get  14 
per  cent  CO2  without  shutting  down  his  plant.  It  was  found 
that  he  reduced  the  draft  to  increase  the  CO2,  and  of  course 
in  doing  so  he  reduced  the  steaming  capacity  of  his  boilers. 
Now  had  he  followed  the  method  indicated  in  this  Chapter  he 
would  have  obtained  an  increased  capacity.  Had  he  stopped 
the  air  leaks  and  improved  the  conditions  in  his  furnaces  he 
would  have  raised  the  CO2  and  he  would  have  had  steam 
to  sell. 

There  is  a  relation  between  the  draft  that  should  be  used 
and  the  resistance  of  the  fuel  on  the  grates.  I  have  taken  as 
high  as  16  per  cent  CO_>  with  no  more  than  a  trace  of  CO 
from  marine  boilers  under  forced  draft  during  a  speed  trial 
at  sea.  The  idea  that  high  CO2  calls  for  low  draft  is  one  of 
the  many  fictions  current  relating  to  combustion  analysis. 
You  can  get  high  CO2  with  any  draft  in  reason,  either  high 
or  low,  provided  the  draft  and  the  fuel  resistance  are  in 
proper  relation. 

Bear  in  mind  that  the  CO2  percentage  indicates  the  ratio 
of  the  air  used  to  the  air  that  has  not  been  used. 

I  can  get  18  per  cent  CO2  from  a  stinking  old  tobacco 
pipe  that  is  one  of  my  prized  possessions,  but  if  I  should 
take  the  fire  out  of  that  pipe  and  put  it  under  a  boiler  I 
couldn’t  get  any  steam  with  it. 

“Your  steam  plant  is  operated  for  the  purpose  of  running 
your  power  plant  and  not  for  the  purpose  of  making  CO2.” 
Why,  sure.  I  admit  it.  And  if  you  do  the  right  thing  by  that 
steam  plant  the  more  CO2  you  make  the  more  steam  you  will 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


113 


get  from  unit  quantity  of  fuel  and  the  more  steam  you  make 
the  less  unit  quantity  of  fuel  you  will  burn. 

These  propositions  have  gone  past  the  point  where  they 
require  defense.  They  are  proved  propositions.  The  physical 
laws  that  govern  combustion  take  sides  with  them. 

The  CO2  percentage  is  an  index  of  efficiency  and  not  of 
capacity,  although,  as  I  have  shown,  it  may  be  taken  as  a 
measure  of  capacity  if  the  draft  is  not  decreased  to  secure 
the  increase  in  the  CO2.  But  however  the  increase  in  the 
CO2  is  attained,  it  is  a  measure  of  efficiency — the  volume  of 
heat-nullifying  cold  air  taken  in  comparison  with  the  volume 
of  heated  gas  developed  by  the  process  of  combustion. 

Everything  that  I  have  said  so  far  is  based  upon  the 
assumption  that  there  is  no  CO  accompanying  the  CO 2. 

When  the  air  supply  is  insufficient  or  improperly  distrib¬ 
uted,  there  will  not  be  enough  Oxygen  to  convert  all  of  the 
Carbon  to  CO2.  Some  of  it  will  have  to  be  satisfied  with  one 
part  of  Oxygen  instead  of  two  parts.  The  Carbon  will  be 
half  burned  and  CO  will  result.  CO  is  the  “Bob-tail  flush” 
of  combustion. 

When  Carbon  is  burned  to  CO2,  14,500  units  of  heat 
energy  are  released  in  the  furnace.  When  it  is  burned  to 
CO,  4,400  heat  units  are  released  and  the  remaining  10,100 
continue  unreleased  in  the  CO  and  with  it  ride  up  the  chimney. 
So  that  when  we  are  basing  a  judgment  as  to  efficiency  upon 
CO 2  percentages  we  must  know  whether  or  not  CO  is  present 
and  if  it  exists  we  must  qualify  our  judgment. 

There  is  as  much  Carbon  in  a  molecule  of  CO  as  in  a 
molecule  of  CO2,  so  that  if  the  gases  show  9  per  cent  CO2 
and  1  per  cent  CO,  90  per  cent  of  the  combustible  has  been 
completely  burned  and  10  per  cent  partly  burned.  This  10 
per  cent  carries  away  10,100  heat  units  per  pound  of  Carbon 
taken  out  of  an  original  14,500,  so  that  the  actual  fuel  loss 
represented  by  the  CO  in  such  case  would  be  10, 000-14, 500ths 
of  10  per  cent.  From  this  statement  you  will  be  able  to  see 
how  the  following  formula  is  derived: 

To  find  the  loss  due  to  CO  in  percentage  terms  of  total 
Carbon  burned  divide  the  percentage  of  CO  by  the  sum  of  the 


114  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


COo  and  CO  percentages,  multiply  by  100,  divide  by  145  and 
multiply  by  101. 

Applying  this  formula  to  a  case  of  9  per  cent  CO2,  and 
1  per  cent  CO,  we  find  that  the  fuel  loss  due  to  the  CO  is 
G.9  per  cent. 

There  has  been  much  discussion  in  the  engineering  jour¬ 
nals  as  to  the  relative  importance  of  the  CO2  and  CO  deter¬ 
minations  in  flue  gas  analysis.  Some  engineers  even  go  so 
far  as  to  recommend  an  analysis  for  CO  every  time  the  CO2 
determination  is  made.  The  main  objection  to  this  is  that  it 
takes  a  lot  of  time  and  means  a  lot  of  really  unnecessary 
work.  The  sensible  method  is  to  first  find  out  how  to  secure 
the  desired  percentage  of  COo  and  then  to  check  the  gas 
sample  for  CO.  It  will  be  found  in  most  cases  that  when  the 
OO2  percentage  has  been  made  right  the  Oxygen  and  CO  will 
fall  into  line  and  be  right  also.  Of  what  concern  is  it  to  us 
if  CO  does  in  fact  exist  with  a  low  percentage  of  CO2,  say  6 
per  cent?  We  don’t  want  the  CO,  of  course,  neither  do  we 
want  the  6  per  cent  CO2,  consequently  we  are  not  concerned 
to  find  the  reason  why  CO  exists  when  we  have  6  per  cent 
CO2.  We  want  14  per  cent  CO2  if  we  can  get  it,  and  we  want 
no  CO  with  that  14  per  cent.  We  might  stand  for  a  trace  of  it, 
but  not  for  much  more.  To  wipe  out  the  undesired  CO  it  may 
be  necessary  to  increase  the  excess  of  air  and  thereby  lower 
the  CO2.  But  the  CO  may  not  owe  its  presence  to  lack  of  air. 
It  may  be  due  to  lack  of  mixture  or  certain  other  causes  that 
will  land  us  in  rather  deep  theory  if  we  attempt  to  consider 
them.* 

Low  CO2  may  be  caused  by  lack  of  air  as  well  as  by 
a  surplus  of  it,  but  the  surplus  is  the  cause  in  almost  every 
instance.  Whatever  the  cause  for  a  drop  in  CO2  the  furnace 
temperature  will  drop  with  it.  We  may  find  CO  with  any 
percentage  of  CO2.  Suppose  that  the  “fire”  is  very  thick 
and  perhaps  “dirty”  in  one  portion  of  the  furnace.  This  con¬ 
dition  would  result  in  the  formation  of  CO  because  not  enough 
air  could  pass  through  the  thick  and  dirty  “fire”  to  reduce  the 
Carbon  to  CO2.  Now  if  there  are  air  leaks  in  the  fuel  on 


*See  page  181. 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


115 


other  portions  of  the  grate  a  large  excess  of  air  would  be 
passed  through  them  and  we  should  have  CO  in  the  flue  gases 
in  the  presence  of  an  excess  of  air. 

I  have  heard  it  stated  that  we  cannot  get  more  than  8 
or  10  per  cent  CO2  without  inviting  CO  in  considerable  quan¬ 
tity,  but  this  is  not  in  accordance  with  my  experience.  T1  do 
not  consider  that  we  are  in  much  danger  from  Co  until  we 
have  reached  about  15  per  cent  CO2.  This  statement  is 
made  upon  the  assumption  that  the  boiler  setting  is  tight  and 
that  there  is  sufficient  draft  for  proper  combustion.  If  the  „ 
setting  is  leaky  we  might  have  to  indulge  in  extremely  thick 
"fires”  to  raise  the  COo  percentage  and  this,  as  explained  in 
the  preceding  paragraph,  might  produce  CO  while  the  air 
taken  in  through  the  setting  would,  of  course,  lower  the  CO2 
percentage  by  diluting  the  gas  volume. 

If  we  are  engaged  in  experimental  or  research  work  we 
must  concern  ourselves,  not  only  with  the  CO2,  but  with  the 
CO  and  SO2  and  with  the  Hydrogen  and  Methane  as  well.  The 
operating  engineer  is  not  engaged  in  research  investigations. 
He  is  engaged  in  making  steam  and  he  wants  to  make  it  as 
economically  a  spossible.  His  plant  is  not  operated  under  test 
conditions,  but  under  severe  working  conditions.  Hence  he 
must  adopt  in  gas  analysis,  as  in  everything  else,  the  methods 
that  are  applicable  to  the  every-day  grind  of  an  every-day 
steam  power  plant.  And  he  will  secure  amazing  results  if 
he  will  begin  with  CO2  and  stick  to  CO2.  I  do  not  mean  that 
he  should  never  make  CO  investigations.  I  insist  that  he 
should  make  them,  but  that  he  should  select  the  right  time 
for  doing  so  and  that  time  will  not  arrive  until  he  has  first 
placed  his  furnaces  upon  a  proper  CO2  basis. 

It  is  a  significant  fact  that  some  of  the  engineers  who 
have  accomplished  the  most  with  flue  gas  analysis,  who  have 
made  savings  as  great  as  40  and  50  per  cent,  have  been  non¬ 
technical  men  who  have  never  gone  farther  in  gas  analysis 
than  the  CO2  determination.  They  have  pursued  air  leaks 
and  studied  draft  regulation.  They  have  "taken  chances”  on 
CO  and  it  is  not  likely  that  much  of  it  is  to  be  found  in 
their  furnace  gases.  And  I  would  back  one  of  these  men 
every  time  for  results  in  the  boiler  room  against  the  man 


116  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

who  is  all  “technical” — who  is  a  mile  long  on  theory  and  ail 
inch  long  on  practice.  When  such  a  man  gets  into  the  boiler 
room  he  will  begin  with  CO  studies  and  he  will  have  resort 
to  formulas  and  other  things  that  are  mystifying.  In  other 
words,  his  work  will  be  of  a  laboratory  kind  and  of  a  research 
nature;  And  as  a  result  of  his  methods  a  shroud  of  mystery 
^will  be  thrown  over  the  whole  performance.  Nobody  in  the 
jfire  room  will  take  any  interest  in  the  thing,  hence  no  benefit 
>will  result  from  it. 

It  will  help  very  much  if  the  engineer  who  is  undertaking 
flue  gas  analysis  will  acquire  some  of  the  theory  on  which 
his  practice  is  based — if  he  will  learn  a  little  of  combustion 
chemistry,  but  it  is  not*  essential  that  he  should  know  any¬ 
thing  at  all  about  the  theory  or  the  chemistry  of  it.  It  is 
essential  that  he  should  follow  right  methods  and  if  he  does 
this  he  will  produce  right  results. 

The  marksman  need  not  know  the  chemical  properties  of 
the  powder  in  the  cartridge  before  making  a  bull’s-eye. 
"Neither  is  it  necessary  that  an  engineer  or  fireman  should 
hnow  what  CO2  really  is,  or  why  it  is,  before  he  begins 
work  with  a  Gas  Analyzer.  A  man  who  can  read  a  ther¬ 
mometer  scale  can  read  that  of  a  Gas  Analyzer  and  if  he 
Will  keep  after  the  Analyzer  until  he  gets  the  right  reading 
he  will  get  results  that  will  surprise  everybody  about  the 
plant — most  of  all  the  Manager. 

Don’t  carry  a  sample  of  gas  in  a  bottle  from  the  boiler 
room  to  the  laboratory.  Make  your  study  of  furnace  condi- 
'tions  right  at  the  furnace  and  make  enough  determinations 
to  acquire  some  real  data.  When  you  have  finished  your 
•investigations  in  the  boiler  room,  say  at  the  end  of  an  hour, 
'or  at  most  two  hours,  reduce  your  data  relating  to  COa  per¬ 
centages,  fuel  thicknesses  and  drafts,  to  curves  upon  a  chart 
’and  this  will  serve  to  show  the  very  relations  you  have  been 
'seeking  to  discover.  Knowing  these  relations  you  may  pro- 
'ceed  to  standardize  the  operating  methods  in  your  boiler  room 
•and  prescribe  a  rule  of  action  for  your  firemen. 

I  think  it  will  now  be  plain  how  the  answers  to  most  of 
The  questions  proposed  in  the  first  chapter  may  be  worked  out. 

When  you  know  how  much  fuel  the  furnace  is  wasting 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


117 


by  heating  excess  air,  how  much  it  is  dropping  in  the  ashpit 
and  how  much  CO  it  is  sending  up  the  chimney,  you  come 
very  near  knowing  the  efficiency  of  that  furnace. 

Employ  the  draft  that  will  carry  your  load  and  produce 
the  highest  percentage  of  CO2  without  CO.  You  must  deter¬ 
mine  by  actual  experiment  what  that  draft  really  is.  With; 
bituminous  coal  it  will  probably  be  in  the  neighborhood  ot' 
oO  hundredths  of  an  inch  over  the  fire.  The  more  ash  the  coal1 
contains  the  more  draft  you  will  have  to  use  and  the  lower 
ihe  maximum  percentage  of  CO2  that  you  will  be  able  to  get* 
Control  the  draft  with  the  boiler  damper  rather  than  with  the 
ash-pit  doors.  J 

Calibrate  all  of  your  dampers.  To  do  this  connect  a  dif-? 
ferential  draft  gage  between  the  damper  and  the  boiler.  Place 
the  damper  in  the  extreme  closed  position.  Then  open  it 
gradually.  Mark  the  position  of  the  damper  when  the  draft 
gage  is  first  affected.  Continue  opening  the  damper  until  the 
gage  stops  registering  an  increment  in  the  draft.  Mark  this 
position  and  adjust  the  damper  to  work  between  those  two 
positions.  The  slightest  movement  of  the  damper  will  then* 
register  its  effect  at  the  furnace  and  the  effect  will  be  pro¬ 
portional  to  the  movement  of  the  damper.  You  will  meet- 
some  surprises  when  you  calibrate  your  dampers.  You  will* 
find  in  some  cases  that  the  damper  is  “wide  open’’  when  it  is' 
partly  closed  and  in  others  that  it  is  “partly  closed”  when 
it  is  wide  open.  A  great  deal  will  depend  upon  how  the 
damper  is  hung  and  the  direction  of  the  normal  gas  flow 
with  respect  to  the  normal  open  position  of  the  damper.  It  is 
of  the  highest  importance  that  the  main  breeching  damper 
should  be  calibrated  before  you  hook  it  up  to  an  automatic 
damper  regulater. 

The  advantages  of  a  damper  regulator  are  liable  to  be 
overestimated.  A  proper  regulator  will  assist  in  securing 
economy.  An  improper  one  may  actually  increase  the  coal 
consumption,  although  it  may  produce  a  perfect  steam  curve 
on  the  chart  of  the  recording  gage.  1 

Regulators  may  be  divided  into  two  general  classes  for 
the  purposes  of  this  discussion : 

1.  The  machines  that  move  the  damper  a  little  when 


118  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


there  is  a  slight  change  in  the  steam  pressure,  the  movement 
of  the  damper  being  proportional  to  the  change  in  pressure. 

2.  The  machines  that  swing  the  damper  from  the  wide 
open  position  to  the  closed  one  when  the  pressure  rises  and 
from  the  closed  position  to  the  wide  open  one  when  the 
pressure  falls. 

Regulators  of  the  second  class  do  not  always  meet  the 
requirements  of  economical  combustion.  When  the  damper  is 
wide  open  the  furnaces  will  be  getting  too  much  air  and  the 
percentage  of  CO9  will  fall.  When  the  damper  is  closed 
the  furnaces  will  not  get  enough  air  and  CO  will  be  formed. 
Machines  of  the  first  class  may  not  make  as  perfect  a  steam 
curve  as  those  of  the  second,  but  they  will  show  economy 
where  the  others  may  produce  waste. 

To  equalize  the  draft  among  the  boilers,  first  see  that  the 
fires  are  all  in  standard  condition — of  the  same  thickness 
without  air  holes  and  free  from  clinkers.  Then  adjust  the 
boilers’  dampers  so  that  all  of  the  furnaces  will  have  the 
same  draft — your  standard  draft,  whatever  it  may  be.  There¬ 
after  you  may  regulate  the  draft  to  meet  the  load  by  shifting 
the  main  breeching  damper.  The  draft  will  vary  with  changes 
of  barometer,  so  that  it  may  be  necessary  for  the  fireman  to 
make  certain  damper  adjustments  every  day,  but  these 
adjustments,  so  far  as  possible,  should  be  confined  to  the 
master  damper  in  the  breeching  and  they  will  consist  in 
altering  the  maximum  open  position  of  the  damper  for  the  day. 

I  have  shown  how  the  air  leakage  through  the  setting  may 
be  measured  by  shifting  the  sampling  pipe  from  the  last  pass 
to  the  first  pass.  Be  sure  that  the  fire  is  in  good  condition 
when  the  test  is  made  and  make  the  two  determinations  very 
close  together,  otherwise  some  condition  affecting  the  air 
excess  may  intervene  in  the  furnace  and  spoil  the  comparison. 
If  the  fuel  on  the  grates  is  peppered  with  thin  spots  and  air 
holes,  a  sample  taken  from  the  first  pass  may  be  misleading. 
Suppose,  for  example,  that  there  is  a  large  air  leak  in  the 
fuel  bed  immediately  below  the  intake  end  of  the  sampling 
pipe.  A  tornado  of  air  will  rush  up  through  it  and  the 
Analyzer  will  report  low  COo  as  a  result  of  that  air,  whereas 
the  actual  average  from  the  furnace  might  be  a  reasonably 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


119 


liigh  percentage  of  COo.  And  conversely,  if  you  should  take 
gas  from  a  section  of  the  furnace  in  which  the  fuel  condi¬ 
tions  were  first  class,  while  in  all  other  sections  they  were 
poor,  the  report  would  be  too  high.  Plug  the  air  leaks  in  the 
setting  and  you  will  then  have  no  occasion  to  measure  the 
air  flowing  through  them. 

The  other  questions  relating  to  excess  air  may  be  an¬ 
swered  by  following  the  same  general  method  of  procedure. 

Don’t  neglect  the  marks  on  the  liners  of  the  furnace  doors 
when  you  have  learned  how  thick  the  particular  coal  you 
are  burning  should  be  carried  on  the  particular  grates  you 
are  using. 

The  coal  best  adapted  to  your  conditions  is  the  coal  that 
you  can  burn  with  the  least  surplus  of  air.  You  are  limited, 
of  course,  by  the  fuels  available  in  your  market  and  you  may 
be  justified  by  price  considerations  in  using  the  fuel  not  best 
adapted  to  your  conditions.  In  planning  a  boiler  plant  the 
fuels  available  should  receive  more  consideration  than  they 
are  usually  accorded  and  the  equipment  purchased  should  be 
selected  with  reference  to  the  fuel  that  you  ought  to  burn. 

Should  the  coal  you  are  using  be  fired  dry  or  wet  for 
greatest  efficiency?  This  will  depend  upon  circumstances  and 
the  question  will  be  answered  by  the  Gas  Analyzer. 

It  takes  heat  units  to  evaporate  the  water  that  you  have 
applied  to  the  coal  and  the  business  of  these  heat  units  is 
to  evaporate  the  water  in  the  boiler.  We  must  make  an 
entry  on  the  debit  side  of  the  ledger. 

When  a  shovelful  of  wet  coal  goes  into  the  furnace,  the 
first  thing  that  happens  is  the  evaporation  of  the  surface 
moisture  clinging  to  the  coal.  This  is  followed  by  the  decom¬ 
position  of  the  resulting  steam  into  its  elements,  Oxygen  and 
Hydrogen.  The  Hydrogen  is  next  ignited  and  burns  back 
again  into  water,  returning  to  the  furnace  the  exact  amount 
of  heat  abstracted  in  the  operation  of  decomposition.  Some 
of  this  heat  will  be  lost  by  radiation,  more  of  it  will  be 
discarded  to  the  chimney  and  some  of  the  Hydrogen  may 
escape  without  being  consumed.  There  is,  accordingly,  a  net 
loss  by  this  operation.  There  is  another  debit. 

But  there  are  credit  entries  also.  Combustible  gases  are 


120  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


being  evolved  from  the  fuel.  The  Hydrogen  flame  assists 
in  igniting  them.  When  water  and  incandescent  coke  come 
into  contact  with  each  other  there  is  an  evolution  of  CO 
as  well  as  of  Hydrogen,  the  Oxygen  of  the  water  uniting 
with  the  Carbon  of  the  coal  to  form  Carbon  Monoxide.  This 
gas  rises  into  the  furnace  chamber  and  burns  with  the 
Hydrogen.  The  area  of  combustion  is  extended  and  we  have 
a  flaming  furnace  through  which  no  combustible  gas  can  pass 
in  the  presence  of  Oxygen  without  burning. 

Fine  coal,  when  thrown  into  the  furnace,  tends  to  “pack,” 
particularly  if  it  is  dry  and  there  is  much  ash  and  foreign 
matter  in  it.  If  it  is  wet,  the  water  when  it  is  converted 
into  steam,  will  loosen  the  packed  coal,  permitting  the  air  to 
flow  more  readily  through  it.  As  a  result  the  coal  will 
burn  more  uniformly  and  you  will  burn  less  of  it  because 
there  will  be  less  combustible  in  the  ash  and  clinker  and 
much  less  combustible  carried  over  by  the  draft  into  the 
combustion  chamber.  There  will  be  fewer  cracks  in  the  fuel 
bed  and  the  coal  will  be  burned  with  a  great  deal  less 
excess  of  air. 

It  is  impossible  to  burn  some  fine  coals  without  wetting 
them.  You  can  burn  any  fine  coal  with  better  results  and 
more  satisfaction  if  you  turn  the  hose  on  the  coal  pile.  Do 
you  prefer  to  smoke  your  cigars  damp  or  kiln  dried? 

The  grate  surface  is  just  right  for  highest  economy  when 
you  can  carry  a  proper  fire  upon  it  without  blowing  off  the 
safety  valve.  The  fire  is  not  proper  if  it  is  so  thin  that  too 
much  unused  air  will  pass  through  it  and  if  you  have  too 
much  grate  surface  you  will  either  have  a  great  excess  of 
air  or  a  popping  safety  valve. 

Smoke  is  due  to  one  of  four  causes  or  to  a  combination 
of  two  or  more  of  them,  viz: 

1.  Lack  of  air;  2,  lack  of  mixture;  3,  lack  of  tempera¬ 
ture,  and  4,  lack  of  space.  Now,  before  blowing  yourself  to 
steam  jets  or  some  other  cure-all  device  for  preventing 
smoke,  it  would  be  wise  to  discover  why  your  chimney  is 
smoking. 

If  the  boiler  setting  is  tight  and  the  gases  show  no  more 
than  12  per  cent  COo,  there  is  an  abundance  of  air  and  nothing 


How  to  Stoj)  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


121 


will  result  by  admitting  more  of  it  except  to  lower  efficiency. 

If  the  furnace  is  white  hot  there  is  plenty  of  temperature. 

If  there  is  an  abundance  of  air  (free  oxygen)  in  the  gases 
and  you  find  CO,  the  trouble  is  insufficient  mixture.  The 
air  is  being  taken  in  at  the  wrong  place,  or  the  design  of 

the  furnace  is  such  that  the  air  taken  is  not  caused  to  mix 

„  • 

with  the  combustible  gases.  The  difficulty  may  be  remedied 
or  ameliorated  by  the  use  of  mixing  piers  or  arches. 

Lack  of  space  is  probably  the  most  common  of  all  the 
causes  of  smoke.  The  grates  must  be  at  such  a  distance 
below  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler  that  the  flame  will 
be  burned  out  before  the  relatively  cold  metal  is  reached. 
Take  any  cold  substance,  a  piece  of  glass,  for  instance,  and 
hold  it  in  the  flame  of  a  gas  jet.  There  will  be  a  deposit 
of  carbon  at  once.  If  your  smoke  is  caused  by  the  snuffing 
out  of  the  flame  upon  the  cold  surfaces  of  the  boiler  you  will 
find  very  little  CO  in  the  gases,  perhaps  none  whatever, 
although  there  may  be  a  great  quantity  of  soot. 

“Smoke  means  waste,”  of  course,  but  as  I  have  already 
pointed  out,  there  is  very  little  fuel  value  in  the  finely  divided 
carbon  that  colors  the  chimney  gases.  A  chimney  that  is 
making  no  smoke  at  all  may  be  throwing  out  more  actual 
combustible  gas  than  one  that  is  a  bad  smoker. 

But  assuming  that  there  is  an  appreciable  quantity  of  real 
combustible  in  the  chimney  gases — we  can  eliminate  it  with¬ 
out  sustaining  a  loss  that  exceeds  the  saving?  If  you  save 
$2.00  by  burning  up  the  combustible  gases  and  lose  $4.00  by 
heating  the  excess  air  that  is  incidental  to  the  process,  how 
much  of  a  gainer  are  you?  To  burn  soft  coal  smokelessly  is 
a  simple  matter,  but  to  burn  it  smokelessly  and  at  the  same 
time  economically  is  up  another  street  altogether.  If  the 
men  who  are  selling  “smokeless  furnaces”  were  compelled  to 
put  their  devices  up  against  a  Gas  Analyzer,  nine-tenths  of 
them  would  go  out  of  business. 

There  was  a  time  when  the  Smoke  Inspector  was  not  con¬ 
cerned  in  the  methods  by  which  you  attained  smokelessness. 
You  could  equip  with  steam  jets  or  any  other  make-shift, 
wasteful  thing  so  long  as  you  stopped  violating  the  ordi¬ 
nances.  And  the  result  of  this  was  that  the  Inspector  was 


122  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


an  Ishmael  among  the  power  producers.  His  hand  was 
against  every  man  and  the  hand  of  every  man  was  against 
him.  It  is  a  cheerful  sign  that  the  times  have  changed  when 
the  Inspector  now  visits  the  plant  in  the  role  of  a  helper 
rather  than  that  of  a  fault  finder.  He  comes  to  advise  and 
while  he  insists  upon  smokelessness,  he  wants  to  see  you  get 
smokelesness  done  up  in  a  wrapper  of  efficiency. 

And  don’t  assume  that  your  boiler  plant  is  efficient  because 
your  chimney  is  not  smoking.  Show  me  a  chimney  that 
never  makes  a  trace  of  smoke  and  I  will  show  you  a  plant 
that  is  not  burning  coal  efficiently. 

The  territory  between  no  smoke — no  combustible  of  any 
kind  in  the  gases — and  highest  efficiency  is  fixed  by  very 
narrow  boundary  lines.  Let  us  draw  a  horizontal  line  and 
consider  it  as  lying  in  the  plane  of  highest  efficiency — com¬ 
plete  combustion  with  the  minimum  supply  of  excess  air. 
Above  this  line  is  the  territory  of  unnecessary  excess  air,  and 
below  it  the  territory  of  air  deficiency.  The  higher  we  go 
above  this  line  the  more  of  a  “hot  air  factory”  we  are  run¬ 
ning.  The  farther  we  go  below  it  the  more  smoke  and  CO 
we  are  making.  If  we  remain  in  the  neighborhood  of  the 
line,  fluctuating  furnace  conditions  will  place  us  first  on  one 
side  of  it  and  then  on  the  other.  There  will  be  periods  of 
no  smoke,  succeeded  by  periods  of  slight  smokiness.  Con¬ 
ditions  like  this  at  the  top  of  the  chimney  usually  point  to 
economical  furnace  operation.  If  there  is  no  smoke  at  all 
we  have  no  means  of  knowing  by  mere  stack  observation  to 
what  extent  the  furnace  may  be  indulging  in  excess  air. 

The  Gas  Analyzer  will  answer  any  strictly  combustion 
question  that  may  be  propounded  to  it.  It  applies  to  Gas 
Producers  and  “Internal  Combustion  Motors,”  but  its  uses  in 
these  connections  cannot  here  be  considered  by  the  author.* 

The  higher  the  percentage  of  CO2,  in  the  absence  of  CO, 
the  higher  the  initial  furnace  temperature.  And  as  a  general 
proposition,  the  higher  the  furnace  temperature  the  greater 
the  efficiency.  Extreme  temperatures  are  destructive  of  brick 
work  but  they  are  not  liable  to  damage  the  tubes  or  sheets 
of  the  boiler,  provided  there  are  no  deposits  of  scale,  mud, 


*  See  Page  181. 


Hoiv  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


123 


The  way  your  H.  R.  T.  Boiler  is  “set”  and  the  wrong  way  to  set 
it — the  grates  28  in.  from  the  boiler  shell  and  the  combustion 
chamber  partly  filled  in.  You  can’t  help  smoking. 


The  way  your  boiler  should  be  set  to  burn  bituminous  coal — the 
grates  about  48  in.  from  the  boiler  shell.  A  “roomy”  com¬ 
bustion  chamber.  Note  the  flat  arch  at  the  rear.* 


*For  a  detailed  discussion  of  smokeless  furnaces  see 
“Combustion  and  Smokeless  Furnaces,”  by  the  Author. 


124  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


oil  or  other  materials  that  will  prevent  intimate  contact 
between  the  water  and  the  metal.  Some  engineers  are  afraid 
of  burning  up  their  boilers,  and  boilers  *are  sometimes 
^bagged”  and  burned,  but  the  trouble  can  usually  be  traced 
to  scale  or  oil.  Why,  you  can  take  a  paper  oyster  pail, 
fill  it  with  water,  set  it  in  the  blue  flame  of  a  gas  burner 
and  boil  eggs  without  marking  the  paper  except  along  the 
folds  where  the  water  is  not  in  actual  contact  with  the  paper. 
If  you  will  try  this  experiment  you  will  cease  to  be  afraid 
of  high  temperatures,  but  you  will  be  more  than  ever  afraid 
of  scale  and  oil.  You  simply  can’t  burn  a  clean  boiler  tube 
if  there  is  water  in  actual  contact  with  it. 

Some  men  are  willing;  to  .spend  a  lot  to 
save  a  little,  but  stick  when  it  comes  to 
spending  a  little  to  save  a  lot. 


The  Draft  Gage  is  a  Compass  by  Which  the  Fireman  Steers 

the  Furnace. 

When  the  liquid  moves  to  the  left,  there  are  holes  in  the  fire  or 
the  fires  are  burning  thin.  When  it  moves  to  the  right  the  fires 
are  too  thick  or  getting  “dirty.”  The  Draft  Gage,  when  con¬ 
nected  at  the  furnace  and  so  located  that  it  can  be  observed 
by  the  fireman,  is  an  exceedingly  useful  boiler  appurtenance. 
It  gives  instant  notification  when  a  hole  forms  in  the  fuel 
bed,  when  the  fires  are  too  thick  or  too  thin,  etc.  The  man 
soon  learns  to  fire  the  furnaces  or  govern  the  stokers  by  it. 
The  Draft  Gage  gives  information  of  bad  furnace  conditions 
some  minutes  in  advance  of  the  steam  gage. 


How  to  Stop  Your  Fuel  Wastes. 


125 


High  temperatures  promote  smokelessness,  because  tem¬ 
perature  is  one  of  the  requisites  of  smokeless  combustion. 
When  the  furnace  salesman  approaches  you,  find  out  how 
much  COo  he  will  guarantee  without  making  CO — not  how 
much  water  he  will  evaporate.  If  he  guarantees  high  COo 
he  is  guaranteeing  furnace  efficiency  and  incidentally  agree¬ 
ing  to  meet  one  of  the  conditions  of  smokeless  combustion. 


nujinuiiii'illuni/ 

BMBIEiO? 

ihtiTOQ! 

- - 

rflTT 

(Cartoon  from  Power  Plant  Engineering.) 


S — stands  for  the  STEAM  you  waste  coal  to  produce 
And  you  waste  the  same  steam  when  you  put  it  to  use. 


CHAPTER  V. 

HOW  TO  KEEP  THE  WASTES  STOPPED. 

When  the  levee  breaks  along  the  lower  Mississippi  they 
stop  the  leak  with  sand. bags  and  niggers.  And  they  stay 
on  the  job  as  long  as  there  is  high  water,  because  it  is  one 
thing  to  stop  a  leak  and  another  thing  to  keep  it  stopped. 
It  is  always  high  water  in  your  boiler  room.  If  you  want 
fuel  economy,  first  stop  the  fuel  wastes  and  then  sit  on  the 
stopper.  It  is  one  thing  to  attain  efficiency  and  another 
thing  to  maintain  it.  If  you  kiss  the  fireman  and  say  “good¬ 
bye”  when  you  are  through  with  your  stopping  operations, 
every  waste,  within  the  man’s  control,  that  you  have  killed 
will  resurrect  itself  and  renew  its  operations. 

I  assisted  in  the  “spotting”  and  stopping  operations  in  an 
Ohio  boiler  room  last  November.  We  calked  the  boiler 
setting  and  jacked  the  CO2  up  from  4  per  cent  to  14  per 
cent.  We  showed  the  fireman  what  the  air  leaks  in  the 
fuel  bed  had  been  doing  to  efficiency  and  we  made  him  under¬ 
stand  what  we  were  saying.  The  meeting  was  adjourned 
after  an  interesting  hour  and  a  half  and  I  returned  to  the 
office  with  the  Manager.  We  talked  for  a  little  while  and 
then  I  said,  “I’ll  bet  you  five  dollars  we  can  go  down  to 
the  boiler  room  right  now  and  find  the  same  old  ‘rat  holes’ 
in  the  fire.”  We  caught  the  fireman  unawares  and  we  found 
them.  It  was  laughable  to  see  the  way  the  man  unlimbered 
himself  to  stop  them.  He  had  neglected  to  pull  the  calking 
out  of  the  air  holes  in  the  boiler  setting,  which  was  prob¬ 
ably  an  oversight,  for  in  every  other  particular  he  had 
reverted  things  to  their  original  condition.  My  friend,  the 
Manager,  jettisoned  his  entire  cargo  of  religion  on  the  spot 
and  swore  like  a  mule  driver. 

Neither  the  Manager  nor  the  Engineer  can  stay  in  the 
boiler  room  and  watch  the  fireman.  Some  means  must  be 
devised  for  keeping  a  check  upon  him.  Human  nature  will 
do  better  work,  no  matter  wrhat  the  field  of  endeavor,  if  it 
is  completely  surrounded  by  some  effective  checking  system. 
You  know  this  and  you  have  time  clocks  and  various  other 
checking  devices  in  your  factory.  You  check  the  output  of 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


127 


each  man  and  machine,  both  as  to  quantity  and  quality.  You 
inspect  operations  in  the  factory  until  you  are  black  in  the 
face,  but  the  black-faced  man  in  the  boiler  room  knows  that 
his  operations  will  not  receive  inspection.  Hence  he  is  a 
careless  and  wasteful  individual,  just  as  I  have  described  him 
and  exactly  as  you  know  him. 

It  takes  some  of  the  stuff  that  sustained  the  martyrs  to 
deal  with  a  fireman.  It  won’t  help  to  swear  at  him  and 
refer  to  his  ancestry.  Neither  will  it  serve  to  employ  verbal 
chocolate  caramels.  The  man  has  a  lot  of  bad  habits — that 
is  all  that  ails  him,  and  it  may  be  as  hard  for  him  to  quit 
them  as  it  is  for  you  to  carry  out  your  New  Year’s  resolutions. 

You  can  make  a  real  good  fireman  out  of  the  poorest  stick 
that  ever  held  a  shovel.  It  is  just  a  matter  of  method,  and 


Irate  Engineers  I  told  you  that  we  must  have  125  pounds  of 
steam  for  our  engines  and  you  are  sitting  here  reading  the 
newspaper  while  the  steam  is  down  to  40  pounds. 

Complacent  Fireman:  AVhat  the  Divii!  Ye  wanted  a  hundred 
and  twinty-foive  pounds  and  Oi  made  it  for  ye.  Use  up  the 
fahrty  pounds  that  ye  have  lift  and  Oi’ll  make  ye  some  more. 
Wot’s  t’e  matter  wid  yef 


128  Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


I  have  promised  to  tell  you  about  the  methods  that  other 
men  have  found  successful  in  dealing  with  their  firemen.  I 
have  also  promised  to  show  how  fuel  waste  may  be  stopped 
by  the  “fiat”  of  the  Manager.  It  is  up  to  me  to  make  good 
in  spite  of  the  difficulties  that  I  have  just  placed  in  my  own 
pathway. 

If  you  want  a  really  good  fireman  in  short  order,  go  and 
get  a  husky  fellow  that  never  fired  a  boiler.  Start  him  right 
and  he  will  think  that  there  is  just  one  way  to  do  it.  He 
won’t  know  how  to  waste  your  fuel.  Give  me  a  green  boy 
from  the  farm  and  I  will  turn  him  into  an  expert  fireman 
in  48  hours.  There  is  just  that  little  to  learn  about  the 
business.  But  you  can’t  always  raise  your  fireman  from  a 
pup.  You  may  have  to  take  whatever  material  you  can  find 
or  whatever  is  sent  you  by  the  fireman’s  union.  This  is 
unfortunate,  because  it  is  easier  to  turn  a  new  man  into  a 
real  expert  than  it  is  to  break  an  old  fireman  of  just  one  bad, 
wasteful  habit. 


Spend  :i  little  less  time  in  your  office  and  a  little  more  time 
in  the  Boiler  Room. 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped 


129 


OLD  NOAH'S  STORY  EXPLODED 
AT  LAST 

“Can’t  Teach  our  Fireman  Anything.” 
Aoah  to  Shem,  Ham  and  Japhet. 

COME  ON,  YOU  WHITE  HOPES! 


This  ignorant  Negro 
can  neither  read  nor 
write.  Of  course,  he 
knows  nothing  about 
Chemistry,  but  he  can 
fire  a  furnace  to  produce 
an  average  of  14  per  cent 

co2. 

Following  is  a  ver¬ 
batim  report  of  an  in¬ 
terview  with  him: 

“Bill,  the  boss  says 
that  you  are  a  good  fire¬ 
man  and  that  he  always 
gets  a  dandy  Recorder 
card  when  you  are  on 
watch.  Tell  me  how 
you  do  it?’’ 

“It  done  took  me  20 
minutes  learn  how  to  fire 
when  I  learn  wid  de  boss 
nigger.  Fire  light  and 
quick,  cover  holes  and 
watch  de  water. 

“Jess  had  good  level 
fire  all  de  time.  Das 

wha  made  de  card. 

“If  jess  steady  load 

wha  could  carry  fire,  jess 
go  up  agin  any  one. 
Doan  kar  who  it  am.” 


“BIULi.” 


130  How  to  Build  JJp  Furnace  Efficiency. 


Three  steps  must  be  taken  to  stop  your  fuel  waste  and 
institute  economy,  viz.: 

1.  You  must  find  the  causes  of  loss  and  the  means  of 
stopping  the  losses.  I  have  mentioned  the  apparatus  and  the 
methods  of  procedure. 

2.  You  must  make  sure  that  the  fireman  fully  under¬ 
stands  what  is  expected  of  him  and  you  must  have  the  means 
of  checking  the  fireman.  You  must  be  able  to  tell  each  fire¬ 
man  at  the  end  of  the  day  how  much  fuel  he  has  saved  by 
carrying  out  your  instructions,  or  how  much  fuel  he  has 
wasted  by  disregarding  them.  Commendation,  when  merited, 
is  quite  as  important  as  criticism. 

3.  You  must  give  the  fireman  some  incentive  to  exert 
himself  to  the  limit  in  the  interest  of  efficiency.  And  the 
exertion  called  for  does  not  mean  extra  labor  for  the  fireman. 
It  means  less  labor,  but  it  also  means  increased  care  and 
watchfurness. 

Now  how  can  you  remain  in  your  office  and  accomplish 
these  three  things  by  what  I  have  termed  your  “fiat”? 

You  can  submit  the  20  questions,  suggested  in  the  first 
chapter,  to  your  engineer  as  a  starter,  and  ask  for  a  specific 
answer  to  each  one  of  them.  Your  “fiat”  will  go  that  far  and 
you  can  tell  whether  the  engineer  is  “guessing”  or  answering. 


They’re  Making;  Fun  of  “Pete.” 
He’s  the  Lowest  on  the  List. 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


131 


If  he  needs  apparatus  for  testing  purposes,  your  “fiat”  will- 
prevail  with  the  purchasing  agent.  And  after  the  apparatus, 
has  arrived  you  can  say  to  the  engineer,  “Here  are  the  tools 
with  which  you  are  to  produce  fuel  economy.  Get  busy.” 
And  you  can  go  and  have  a  look  and  see  if  he  is  busy.  No¬ 
body  has  the  small-pox  in  your  boiler  room.  It  will  be  safe 
for  you  to  go  down  there  for  a  few  minutes  and  watch  these 
interesting  “spotting”  and  stopping  operations. 

And  after  the  checking  system  has  been  instituted  your 
“fiat”  will  bring  the  daily  chart  or  daily  report  on  the  fire¬ 
men  to  your  office.  If  it  is  not  waiting  for  you  in  the  morning 
you  can  send  for  the  engineer  and  heat  up  the  grid-iron. 

If  it  seems  advisable  to  capitalize  economy  in  your  boiler 
room  and  make  your  firemen  stockholders  in  the  enterprise 
your  “fiat”  will  establish  a  bonus  system.  If  you  do  not  want 

Finding'  the  Average 
Percentage  of  C(>s 
at  the  E?ad  of  the 
Watch. 

Each  fireman’!1!  aver¬ 
age  is  posted  on  a, 
bulletin  board  at 
the  end  of  the  day. 
The  man  who  makes 
the  best  average 
lead!!  the  list.  The 
averages  for  each 
shift  are  posted  al¬ 
so.  Fuel  economy 
is  thereby  made  a. 
sporting  proposi¬ 
tion.  There  is  riv¬ 
alry  between  the 
men  individually 
and  collectively. 
The  result  is  much 
lower  coal  bills. 

Horizontal  arrow  in¬ 
dicates  Gas  Analyz¬ 
er  and  vertical  ar¬ 
row  .Gas  Collector 

Using  a  Gas  Analyzer  and  Gas  Collector  to  determine  How 

Much  Fuel  the  Fireman  Wasted.  The  Figures  Are 
an  Excellent  Stimulus  When  Placed  Ilefore  Him. 


132  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


♦ 

to  pay  a  bonus,  your  “fiat”  will  place  a  blackboard  in  the 
boiler  room  on  which  the  daily  records  of  each  man  and 
each  watch  can  be  posted.  The  baseball  score  will  be  unable 
to  compete  with  that  blackboard  for  interest.  When  you  play 
ehch  watch  against  every  other  watch,  and  each  fireman 
against  every  other  fireman,  fuel  economy  becomes  a  sporting 
proposition.  Your  ingenuity  may  suggest  other  expedients 
to  increase  the  interest  of  the  game — for  example:  You  can 
put  all  of  the  white  men  on  one  watch  and  the  niggers  and  the 
Irish  on  another.  Being  an  Irishman  myself  I  know  that  such 
division  would  lead  to  spirited  competition. 

Fuel  economy,  Mr.  Manager,  must  be  instituted  and 
maintained  by  your  “fiat”  and  it  cannot  be  instituted  and 
maintained  in  any  other  manner.  As  explained  in  the  first 
chapter,  when  I  use  the  term  “Manager”  I  am  referring  to 
the  person  who  is  the  court  of  last  resort  on  all  matters 
pertaining  to  the  power  department — the  man  to  whom  the 
engineer  must  go  when  he  wants  to  buy  anything  or  to  do 
anything  out  of  the  routine  order.  In  some  establishments, 
the  Chief  Engineer  himself  is  this  court  of  last  resort,  and  in 
such  cases  he  is  the  man  to  whom  I  am  referring  when  I 
say  “Manager.” 

The  “Manager,”  whoever  he  may  be,  must  start  things 
on  the  road  to  betterment  and  he  can  make  betterment  “stay 
put”  when  it  is  achieved  by  causing  whatever  checking  system 
he  may  adopt  to  be  treated  as  a  part  of  the  daily  routine. 
No  other  method  will  get  you  anywhere.  What  applies  to  the 
establishment  of  any  other  factory  reform  or  innovation, 
applies  to  this  case  also. 

How  shall  we  check  the  “fireman”  and  make  sure  that  he 
is. really  following  the  methods  that  will  produce  the  most 
steam  with  the  least  fuel? 

I 

Flue  gas  analysis  serves  two  purposes  in  the  boiler  room, 

viz. : 

First:  It  points  out  the  errors  of  furnace  management. 
It  locates  the  wastes  of  energy,  assigns  the  causes  and  sug¬ 
gests  the  remedies.  It  assists  in  “building  up”  furnace 
efficiency.  This  building  .up  operation  is  like  any  other  one. 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped . 


133 


It  is  a  case  of  one  brick  upon  another  until  the  structure  is 
completed. 

Second:  It  serves  as  a  check  upon  the  furnace  and  the 
fireman  and  maintains  the  efficiency  structure  after  the  build¬ 
ing  has  been  finished. 

I  must  not  be  understood  to  mean  that  combustion  analysis 
has  no  limitations  in  the  good  that  it  can  accomplish  in  the 
boiler  room.  No  furnace  can  be  operated  under  ideal  con¬ 
ditions,  for  reasons  that  are  known  to  every  operating  enr 
gineer.  The  load  fluctuates  and  the  moods  of  the  coal  dealer 
are  subject  to  changes.  These  things  must  be  taken  as  they 
come  and  we  must  make  the  most  of  them.  Many  engineers 
take  the  following  position  and  it  seems  to  me  quite  unten¬ 
able:  “With  our  ragged  load  line,  our  rotten  coal  and  our 
poor  firemen  we  are  up  against  it  and  we  can  make  no  pre¬ 
tensions  of  economy.  The  methods  recommended  would  work 
out  very  well  in  most  plants  but  it  would  be  useless  to 
attempt  them  in  ours.” 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  harder  the  conditions  are  in  the 
boiler  room,  the  more  important  it  is  that  an  effort  be  made 
to  correct  them.  The  sicker  you  are  the  more  you  need  the 
help  of  medicine.  Suppose  it  is  impossible  to  place  your  plant 
upon  as  high  a  plane  of  efficiency  as  that  enjoyed^by  your 
neighbor?  The  savings  actually  possible  to  you  may  be  far 
greater  than  your  neighbor  can  make,  and  a  dollar  is  a  dollar 
wherever  you  find  it. 

A  few  years  ago  I  was  called  to  a  down-town  plant  in 
Chicago.  It  was  mid-summer  and  there  was  very  little  use 
for  steam.  There  was  one  large  boiler  in  service  and  it  was 
being  operated  at  only  about  20  per  cent  of  its  capacity.  The 
boiler  was  served  by  a  type  of  stoker  that  made  a  reduction 
of  grate  surface  impossible.  The  plant  needed  a  small 
boiler  unit  for  the  summer  load,  but  it  didn’t  have  one.  The 
flue  gases  were  carrying  only  2  per  cent  C02,  which  you  wilj 
find  on  reference  to  the  charts  and  tables  given  elsewhere 
indicated  a  preventable  loss  of  nearly  three-quarters  of  the 
fuel  burned.  We  were  able  to  get  4  per  cent  with  very  little 
trouble  and  without  lifting  the  safety  valves,  but  we  could 
not  get  more  than  that  without  blowing  off  steam. 


134  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


The  engineer  said,  “What’s  the  use?  I  am  as  much 
'ashamed  of  4  per  cent  as  2  per  cent.”  The  use  was  just 
this:  That  2  per  cent  increase  in  COo  meant  a  saving  of 
about  43  per  cent  of  the  fuel,  and  while  at  4  per  cent  there 
was  still  a  waste  of  31  per  cent  that  he  could  not  avoid,  the 
43  per  cent  that  he  could  stop  was  mighty  well  worth  going 
.after. 

If  you  are  in  the  bad  lands  of  engineering  and  you  can  get 
where  the  lands  are  not  quite  so  bad,  it  is  your  duty  to 
emigrate.  You  would  be  foolish  to  stay  where  you  are  just 
because  you  can’t  reach  the  land  of  Beulah.  The  best  any¬ 
body  can  do  is  to  do  the  best  he  can  do  and  it  is  a  foolish 
man  who  will  not  try  at  all  because  he  knows  the  ideal  is 
unattainable. 

I  regard  the  simple  hand  manipulated  Gas  Analyzer  as 
indispensable  to  the  steam  power  plant.  You  can  “build  up” 
with  it  and  when  this  has  been  done  you  can  check  the  fireman 
with  it,  provided  you  have  some  satisfactory  means  of  collect¬ 
ing  an  average  gas  sample. 

The  instrument  shown  elsewhere  was  designed  by  the 
author  expressly  for  the  class  of  work  in  the  boiler  room 
that  has  been  described  in  these  pages.  It  is  a  modified  form 
of  the  well  known  laboratory  Orsat.  The  laboratory  features 
have  been  eliminated  and  other  features  have  been  added 
which  adapt  the  apparatus  for  the  engineer’s  uses.  A  deter¬ 
mination  of  CO2  may  be  made  in  45  seconds  with  this  instru¬ 
ment. 

The  drawing  shows  the  principle  of  the  Orsat  Analyzer 
as  designed  by  the  chemist,  Orsat,  about  50  years  ago.  An 
explanation  is  appended  to  it.  In  speaking  of  the  Orsat  it 
is  only  fair  to  mention  the  Hempel  and  Elliott  Gas  Analyzers, 
which  together  with  several  others  are  obtainable  of  any 
laboratory  supply  house. 

All  of  the  present  methods  of  Gas  Analysis  by  absorption 
have  been  in  use  for  a  half  a  century  in  the  laboratory.  These 
methods  were  devised  long  before  anyone  dreamed  of  using 
a  Gas  Analyzer  in  the  boiler  room  and  hence  the  laboratory 
features.  The  author  worked  with  all  of  these  instruments 
prior  to  designing  his  own  apparatus,  and  was  driven  by  the 


135 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


ILLUSTRATION  SHOWING  THE  “ORSAT” 
PRINCIPLE  OF  GAS  ANALYSIS. 


HAYS  IMPROVED  GAS  ANALYZER 

1918  MODEL 
PATENT  NO.  1.077.34; 


Engineer's  Gas  Ana¬ 
lyzer —  a  modified 
form  of  “Orsat”  de¬ 
signed  by  the  au¬ 
thor. 


Diagrammatic  Orsat. 


The  gas  to  be  analyz¬ 
ed  is  taken  into  the 
“burette”  “B,”  the  cock 
“  Bl”  being  opened  for 
the  purpose.  The  “Level¬ 
ing  Bottle”  “L”  is  filled 
with  water.  “L”  is  then 
raised  with  the  hand  and 
water  flows  from  it 
through  the  connecting 
rubber  tube  into  “B,” 
“seeking  its  level.”  “Bl” 
is  closed  when  the  water 
reaches  the  zero  mark 
on  the  scale  etched  on 
“B.”  The  water  levels  in 
“B”  and  “L”  should  then 
be  in  the  same  horizontal 
plane,  thus  giving  a 
measurement  at  atmoss- 
pheric  pressure  of  the 
exact  gas  sample  called 
for  by  the  “burette.” 


“A”  is  charged  with  a  gas  absorb¬ 
ing  liquid.  The  cock  “Al”  is  opened 
and  “L”  raised,  the  water  driving  the 
gas  from  “B”  into  “A,”  displacing 
the  liquid  in  the  latter.  The  COa  con¬ 
tained  in  the  gas  is  absorbed  by  the 
liquid,  and  this  causes  a  contraction 
in  the  gas  sample.  The  gas  remain¬ 
ing  is  then  pulled  back  into  “B”  by 
lowering  the  Leveling  Bottle.  The 
chemical  (Caustic  Potash  solution) 
must  be  drawn  up  into  the  capillary 
tube  at  the  top  of  “A”  before  the 
cock  “Al”  is  closed. 

The  bottle  “L”  is  then  held  in  such 
position  that  the  surface  of  the  wa¬ 
ter  is  in  the  same  horizontal  plane 
as  that  of  the  water  in  “B.”  This 
places  the  gas  under  atmospheric 
pressure  and  the  reading  is  taken. 

Additional  absorber  pipettes,  simi¬ 
lar  to  “A,”  are  connected  by  a  mani¬ 
fold  with  “B”  and  charged  with  the 
proper  solution  if  Oxygen  and  CO 
are  to  be  determined. 


136  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency 


GAS  COLLECTOR,  WITH  WATER  FLOW  REGULATOR. 
(Designed  by  the  Author) 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


137 


exigencies  of  the  situation  to  devise  something  suited  to  the 
requirements  of  the  boiler  room. 

About  ten  years  ago  the  author  began  experimenting 
with  devices  to  collect  average  gas  samples.  When  the  fire¬ 
man  has  been  shown  how  to  produce  14  or  15  per  cent  COo 
it  is  essential,  if  you  would  maintain  any  sort  of  check  upon 
him,  to  know  at  the  end  of  the  day  how  much  COo  he  has 
in  fact  produced  on  the  average  during  the  day.  To  this 
end  a  device  to  draw  a  continuous  stream  of  gas  into  a 
receptacle  at  a  uniform  rate  throughout  whatever  period  the 
fireman  may  be  on  watch,  is  necessary.  It  is  an  easy  matter 
to  get  gas  into  a  can  or  bottle  and  get  it  out  again  for  analysis. 
All  you  have  to  do  is  to  connect  the  bottle  at  the  top  by  a 
tube  with  the  flue  through  which  the  gas  is  passing,  fill  the 
bottle  with  water  and  allow  the  water  to  run  out  slowly 
from  the  bottle.  As  the  water  head  falls  gas  is  drawn  into 
the  bottle.  This  is  the  principle  upon  which  all  gas  collect¬ 
ing  devices  have  been  based  and  the  trouble  with  it  is  that 
it  requires  considerable  modification  before  it  can  be  used. 
To  collect  an  average  gas  sample  is  one  of  the  hard  things 


138  Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


that  look  easy  and  unless  the  sample  is  an  average  one  it  may 
be  very  misleading. 

The  rate  at  which  water  will  flow  from  a  tank  or  bottle 
depends  upon  two  things,  viz. — the  opening  through  which 
the  water  is  allowed  to  escape  and  the  head  of  water  above 
the  opening.  As  the  head  falls  the  rate  of  outflow  decreases 
and  it  is  plain  to  be  seen  that  the  inflow  of  gas  depends  upon 
the  outflow  of  water. 

HOW  THE  AUTHOR  MADE  A  FOOL  OF  HIMSELF 

The  author’s  first  experiments  with  Gas  Collectors  were 
conducted  at  the  plant  of  one  of  the  brewing  companies  in 
Chicago.  He  produced  a  really  ridiculous  contrivance  and 
abandoned  it  at  the  end  of  the  first  day.  It  is  shown  in  the 
sketch  preceding. 

Water  was  allowed  to  drain  from  the  upper  bottle  into 
the  lower  one,  the  rate  of  flow  being  fixed  by  a  pinch  clamp 
on  the  connecting  rubber  tube.  As  the  water  fell  gas  was 
drawn  in  throught  the  tube  “C.” 

It  was  intended  that  the  lower  bottle  should  be  set  upon 
the  upper  shelf  when  ready  to  analyze  the  gas  sample,  as 
shown  by  the  dotted  lines  in  the  illustration.  The  clamp  on 
the  tube  “C”  could  then  be  closed  and  the  one  on  the  con¬ 
necting  rubber  tube  removed.  Water  would  then  ffow  by 
gravity  back  into  the  first  bottle  and  drive  the  gas  out  through 
the  tube  “D”  to  the  Gas  Analyzer. 

The  trouble  with  this  arrangement  was  that  on  the  start 
of  the  gas  collecting  operation  the  water  stood  at  “A”  in  the 
upper  bottle  and  at  “Al”  in  the  lower  bottle,  while  at  the 
conclusion  of  the  operation  the  levels  were  at  “B”  and  “Bl” 
respectively.  These  differences  in  head  defeated  the  object  of 
the  device,  that  of  collecting  an  AVERAGE  gas  sample. 

The  absurd  contrivance  took  gas  many  times  faster  on 
the  start  than  on  the  finish,  so  that  it  was  utterly  impossible 
to  say  at  the  end  of  the  watch  what  the  real  average  for 
the  watch  had  been.  The  only  case  in  which  such  a  device 
could  be  used  would  be  where  the  percentage  of  CO2  is 
uniform  throughout  the  entire  watch  and  in  such  case  it 
would  be  unnecessary  to  employ  a  Gas  Collector  at  all,  as  a 
single  snap  shot  sample  taken  at  any  time  during  the  day 


Hoiv  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


139 


■would  provide  the  necessary  information.  Unhappily  the  CO 2 
percentage  is  constantly  fluctuating  and  if  we  would  know 
the  real  efficiency  of  the  fireman  we  must  know  the  real 
average  produced  by  him.  When  he  is  cleaning  fires  a  large 
excess  of  air  will  be  taken  and  this  will  of  course  affect  the 
sample  collected.  It  will  be  seen  that  it  would  make  a  lot 
of  difference  whether  the  Collector  was  running  fast  or  slow 
during  the  cleaning  operation.  In  some  plants  there  are  many 
periods  during  the  day  when  the  boilers  are  hit  with  unusual 
loads  and  other  periods  when  the  loads  are  extremely  light. 
Extraordinary  care  must  be  exercised  by  the  fireman  at  these 
times  or  he  will  waste  a  great  deal  of  fuel.  It  is  very  obvious 
that  ■with  such  a  gas  collecting  scheme  as  the  author  first 
devised  the  engineer  would  be  quite  unable  to  say  what  the 
fireman’s  efficiency  had  been. 

Some  men  have  to  be  hit  with  a  brick  before  they  can  see 
anything  and  a  good  sized  one  hit  the  author  when  he  stood 
in  front  of  his  first  gas  collector  and  watched  it  operate.  The 
thing  started  with  quite  a  respectable  outflow  of  water.  By 
the  end  of  the  second  hour  the  stream  had  slowed  down  to  a 
drizzle  pizzle.  From  then  on  the  rate  of  discharge  suffered 
a  constant  decrease. 

Any  school-boy  student  of  physics  would  have  been  able 
to  predict  this  result  because  every  school-boy  knows  that 
the  pressure  at  the  outflow  opening  depends  upon  the  head 
of  water  above  the  opening.  In  this  case  the  author  had  a 
falling  head  of  water  in  the  upper  bottle  and  a  rising  head 
of  water  in  the  lower  one. 

Since  that  time  the  author  has  designed  a  number  of  gas 
collecting  devices,  all  of  them  equipped  with  flow-regulators. 
One  of  these  is  showui  in  the  illustration  on  a  preceding  page. 

The  Automatic  Gas  Collector  is  intended  as  a  substitute 
for  the  more  expensive  automatic  CO2  Recorder.  The  Col¬ 
lector  and  Recorder  both  work  toward  the  same  end  and  you 
can  raise  your  plant  to  the  highest  state  of  combustion 
efficiency  with  either.  The  Recorder  produces  a  graphic  chart 
and  the  Collector  merely  assembles  a  sample  of  gas  which 
somebody  must  analyze  with  a  hand  instrument.  The  advan¬ 
tages  of  a  graphic  chart  showing  all  of  the  variations  in 


140  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


efficiency  during  the  day  cannot  he  overestimated.  Each 
device  has  its  advantages  over  the  other  and  the  author  ought 
to  state  in  fairness  what  they  are: 

The  Collector  has  the  following  advantages  over  the 
Recorder: 

1.  The  cost  is  much  lower  and  it  is  possible  to  equip  an 
entire  boiler  plant  with  Collectors  at  the  expense  of  equip¬ 
ping  one  boiler  with  a  Recorder.  In  selecting  an  equipment, 
however,  it  should  be  remembered  that  cost  is  not  the  only 
thing  to  be  considered.  It  is  not  what  the  apparatus  costs — it 
is  the  returns  that  the  apparatus  will  yield  that  should  be 
the  deciding  factor. 

Suppose,  for  example,  that  you  have  a  checking  device, 
either  a  Collector  or  a  Recorder,  on  but  one  boiler.  The  fire¬ 
men  will  know  which  boiler  is  being  checked  and  that  boiler 
will  get  most  of  the  attention.  The  result  may  be  that  the 
efficiency  of  the  plant  will  be  less  than  before  the  equip¬ 
ment  was  put  in  use.  The  firemen  may  so  neglect  the 
furnaces  that  are  not  being  checked  in  order  to  make  a  good 
showing  on  the  one  that  is  under  supervision,  that  the  result 
may  be  an  actual  fuel  loss  instead  of  a  fuel  saving.  In  such 
a  case  the  apparatus  would  work  to  fool  the  Manager  and 
Engineer  of  the  plant  rather  than  to  check  the  fireman. 

2.  When  you  have  a  Collector  or  Recorder  on  each 
boiler  the  firemen  cannot  play  favorites  and  if  one  boiler 
furnace  does  not  perform  as  well  as  another  and  persists  in 
its  failure  you  may  presume  with  considerable  assurance  that 
an  air  leak  has  developed  somewhere  or  that  something  else 
beyond  the  jurisdiction  of  the  fireman  has  intervened.  You 
will  look  into  that  boiler  and  find  the  trouble. 

There  should  be  a  draft  gage  connected  with  each  boiler 
furnace  so  that  the  fireman  will  be  able  to  equalize  the  drafts. 
The  gage  will  further  assist  the  fireman  by  indicating  when 
the  fuel  bed  has  burned  down  too  thin  or  has  developed  air 
leaks.  The  gage  will  show  a  marked  drop  in  the  draft  under 
such  circumstances.  The  fireman  will  learn  in  a  short  time 
to  watch  the  draft  gage  as  he  watches  the  steam  and  water 
gages. 

3.  It  is  quite  essential  at  times  to  check  the  furnace  gases 


141 


Hoiv  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped . 


AUTOMATIC  C02  AND  DRAFT  RECORDER. 
^Designed  the  Author) 


142  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


WHAT  A  C02  AND  DRAFT  RECORDER  CHART 

LOOKS  LIKE. 


for  the  average  CO  as  well  as  C02.  This  is  possible  where 
the  Gas  Collectors  are  employed.  It  is  impossible  where 
CO2  Recorders  are  used. 

4.  The  average  C02  cannot  be  determined  closely  from 
a  CO2  Recorder  chart.  It  can  be  determined  very  closely 
by  analysis  of  the  gas  trapped  in  the  Collector.  And  it  is 
quite  essential  that  you  should  know  the  average,  especially 
if  the  percentage  is  low.  By  referring  to  the  tables  pre¬ 
viously  given,  you  will  note  that  in  the  lower  ranges  of  C02 
every  fraction  of  a  per  cent  counts  for  something.  If  your 
firemen  are  reducing  the  preventable  loss,  even  at  as  slow 
a  pace  as  1  per  cent  of  coal  a  day,  you  have  reason  for 
rejoicing.  They  will  get  there  in  25  days  if  they  keep  it  up, 
providing  your  waste  is  25  per  cent.  You  want  to  know 
whether  you  are  progressing,  standing  still  or  retrograding. 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


143 


This  you  can  learn  by  means  of  the  hand  Analyzer  and  Gas 
Collector.  When  you  compare  two  C02  Recorder  charts  you 
will  have  some  trouble  to  determine  which  is  really  the  best 
if  the  charts  are  anywhere  near  alike  as  to  averages. 

The  above  are  the  advantages  of  the  Gas  Collector  over 
the  Recorder. 

The  advantage  of  the  Recorder  lies  in  the  fact  that  it 
produces  a  graphic  chart,  which  shows  not  only  what  hap¬ 
pened,  but  when  it  happened.  The  chart  may  also  be  made 
to  show  the  draft  and  the  temperature  of  the  escaping  flue 
gases  by  combining  with  the  C02  recording  gage  the  necessary 
draft  and  temperature  recording  apparatus.  Such  a  com¬ 
bined  chart  should  accordingly  show  any  relation  that  might 
exist  between  the  C02,  the  draft  and  the  temperature  of  the 
escaping  gases. 

C02  Recorders  have  been  upon  the  American  market  for 
about  twelve  years  and  it  is  putting  it  mildly  to  say  that  they 
have  given  themselves  a  black  eye  in  steam  power  plants. 
Both  eyes  have,  in  fact,  been  decorated.  The  circumstances 
are  unfortunate  and  they  are  due  to  the  following  causes: 

1st.  The  inherent  defects  in  the  earlier  Recorders,  which 
the  author  is  pleased  to  say  have  now  been  largely  remedied 
in  most  of  the  later  Recorders  and  entirely  remedied  in  some 
of  them. 

2nd.  Failure  on  the  part  of  Recorder  manufacturers  to 
explain,  and  failure  on  the  part  of  Recorder  purchasers  to 
understand,  what  the  real  functions  and  limitations  of  the 
CO2  Recorder  are. 

As  a  result  of  these  two  things  C02  Recorders  have  a 
bad  reputation  and  it  takes  time  to  live  that  sort  of  a  reputa¬ 
tion  down.  You  will  find  hundreds  of  Recorders  standing 
unused  today  in  the  dark  corners  of  steam  power  plants  and 
if  you  wish  to  make  some  power  men  see  red  all  that  you  have 
to  do  is  to  mention  C02  Recorders. 

The  C()2  Recorder  has  been  greatly  overestimated  by  the 
manufacturers  and  it  is  at  present  greatly  misunderstood  by 
the  public.  It  is  high  time  for  somebody  to  stand  up  and 
spit  out  the  facts  about  the  apparatus.  I  shall  endeavor  to 
write  the  truth  in  as  unprejudiced  a  manner  as  possible. 


144  Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


If  you  will  talk  with  many  of  the  engineers  who  have 
used  CO2  Recorders  you  will  get  this  sort  of  an  expression 
from  them: 

“The  Recorder  would  probably  be  all  right  and  help  us  a 
great  deal  if  it  would  only  ‘run.’  The  one  we  have  never  ran 
long  enough  to  give  us  a  line  on  anything.” 

Any  apparatus  that  requires  a  couple  of  college  professors 
in  constant  attendance  to  keep  it  in  operation  has  no  place 
in  a  steam  power  plant.  We  may  even  go  so  far  as  to  say 
that  any  recording  apparatus  that  requires  more  than  the 
irreducible  minimum  of  attention  has  no  business  in  an  engine 
room  and  less  than  no  business  in  a  boiler  room. 

The  requisites  of  a  practical  CO2  Recorder  are  as  follows: 

1.  It  must  “stay  put”  and  keep  on  running  indefinitely 
after  it  has  been  started. 

2.  It  must  require  no  attention  other  than  that  necessary 
to  change  the  chart,  renew  the  chemicals  and  change  the 
filtering  material  in  the  gas  line. 

3.  It  must  be  automatic  in  all  particulars,  including  the 
adjustments  that  are  necessary  to  compensate  for  changes  of 
temperature,  changes  of  volume  and  of  specific  gravity  in 
the  absorbent  solution,  changes  of  draft  in  the  boiler,  etc. 
In  other  words,  the  apparatus  must  look  after  itself  and  take 
care  of  all  of  the  variables  with  which  a  CO2  Recorder  is 
forced  to  contend. 

4.  There  must  be  the  minimum  of  moving  reciprocating 
parts.  The  less  there  are  of  them  the  longer  the  apparatus 
will  “stay  put,”  because  it  is  in  the  nature  of  mechanical 
contrivances  to  get  out  of  order,  especially  when  they  are  of 
the  delicate  nature  demanded  in  an  apparatus  of  the  kind 
considered. 

In  some  of  the  earlier  Recorders  there  were  as  many  as 
50  points  of  adjustment  and  it  required  an  expert  adjuster 
to  keep  the  apparatus  in  proper  operation.  Some  of  the 
modern  Recorders  have  no  points  of  manual  adjustment  what¬ 
ever  and  no  mechanical  parts  whatever.  It  is  accordingly 
possible  today  to  secure  an  apparatus  that  will  meet  the 
requirements  as  above  set  forth. 

In  soliciting  proposals  from  the  manufacturers  of  CO2 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


145 


Recorders  the  author  suggests  that  guaranties  be  asked  upon 
the  following  points: 

1.  The  length  of  time  that  the  apparatus  will  be  guar¬ 
anteed  to  operate  properly  without  attention  other  than  that 
required  to  change  the  chart,  renew  the  chemical  for  absorbing 
the  COo  and  change  the  filtering  material  used  to  clean 
the  gas. 

2.  The  annual  cost  of  upkeep,  including  the  cost  of 
charts  and  chemicals. 

A  statement  should  also  be  asked  as  to  the  method  of 
controlling  the  variables  of  temperature,  etc.,  referred  to  in 
a,  preceding  paragraph,  the  number  of  the  points  of  adjustment 
about  the  apparatus  and  the  extent  to  which  movable  mechan¬ 
ical  parts  are  employed. 

With  the  information  on  the  points  suggested  in  hand 
you  will  know  which  apparatus  to  purchase  and  where  to 
get  it. 

The  earlier  Recorders  failed,  first  because  of  inherent 
defects  in  the  Recorders  themselves,  and  second  because  the 
apparatus,  when  it  did  work,  could  not  live  up  to  the  claims 
made  for  it  by  the  manufacturers. 

Now,  what  are  the  functions  of  a  CO2  Recorder? 

The  apparatus  is  a  watchman,  and  a  good  one,  but  no 
more.  It  will  help  you  to  keep  the  wastes  stopped  after 
you  have  first  “spotted”  them  and  stopped  them.  It  will 
help  you  to  maintain  efficiency  after  you  have  attained  it. 
It  is  not  the  proper  apparatus  for  “diagnosing”  combustion 
troubles  or  “building  up  furnace”  efficiency.  I  do  not  say 
that  you  cannot  diagnose  or  build  up  with  it.  I  say  that  it 
is  not  the  proper  apparatus  for  that  purpose  and  I  make  that 
statement  because  with  a  hand  analyzer  I  can  do  more 
“diagnosing”  and  “building  up”  in  an  hour  than  I  can  with  a 
CO2  Recorder  in  a  month;  and  I  can  diagnose  some  things 
with  the  hand  instrument  that  I  could  not  attempt  at  all  with 
a  Recorder.  There  is  no  sense  in  waiting  a  month  for  the 
information  that  you  can  obtain  in  an  hour.  When  you  buy  a 
Recorder  buy  a  “hand  analyzer”  also.  You  will  then  be 
equipped  for  all  sorts  of  combustion  investigations.  When 
necessary  you  can  test  for  CO. 


146  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


The  CO o  Recorder  will  tell  you  in  what  way  the  fireman 
has  carried  out  your  instructions,  whether  he  has  observed 
the  methods  that  your  investigations  with  the  hand  instru¬ 
ment  have  proved  to  be  necessary.  It  will  spur  each  one  of 
your  firemen  to  his  best  efforts  because  it  is  human  nature 
to  be  more  careful  when  therq  is  a  watchman  looking  on.  It  is 
human  nature  to  hustle  when  the  race  is  on  with  another  man. 

There  is  a  CO2  Recorder  in  an  Eastern  power  plant  and 
considerable  competition  among  the  firemen.  One  of  the  men 
succeeded  in  making  a  particularly  good  record  and  he  led  his 
fellows  to  the  Recorder  gage,  exhibited  the  chart  and  invited 
them  to  “Go  to  it  and  beat  that.”  While  none  of  them  suc¬ 
ceeded  in  beating  it,  some  of  them  did  succeed  in  measuring- 
up  to  it. 

With  the  hand  instrument  you  can  make  sure  that  your 
boiler  setting  is  in  proper  condition — you  can  test  here,  there 
and  wherever  you  wish  with  it.  You  can,  as  I  have  explained, 
look  at  the  furnace  when  you  look  at  the  instrument  and  you 
can  refer  the  result  of  each  analysis  to  the  observed  furnace 
conditions  that  produced  the  result.  You  cannot  do  this  with 
a  Recorder.  Don’t  let  any  salesman  persuade  you  that  you  can. 

It  takes  time  to  get  the  gas  from  the  boiler  to  the  Re¬ 
corder.  It  must  flow  through  a  considerable  length  of  pipe 
and  through  soot  filters.  There  is  necessarily  some  “lag” 
on  this  account.  The  “lag”  may  be  anywhere  from  two 
minutes  to  fifteen  minutes.  The  less  of  it  the  better.  On 
account  of  this  the  fireman  cannot  guide  his  operations  by 
any  CO2  Recorder  chart  or  by  any  “CO2  Indicator”  accessory 
to  the  Recorder.  To  be  sure,  the  Chart  and  the  Indicator  of 
the  Recorder  will  tell  the  fireman  that  there  is  a  hole  in  the 
fire,  but  it  will  report  the  information  anywhere  from  2  to  15 
minutes  after  the  hole  began  business.  A  differential  draft 
gage  will  report  the  hole  the  instant  that  hole  appears  and  the 
fireman  can  get  instant  action.  You  need  gages  for  the  pur¬ 
pose  of  draft  equalization  as  set  forth  in  a  previous  chapter. 
Have  your  firemen  rely  upon  them  as  indicators  of  furnace 
conditions.  Any  manufacturer  of  CO2  Recorders  will  be  glad 
to  supply  you  with  a  CO2  Indicator  if  you  are  foolish  enough 
to  order  such  an  attachment.  Don’t  order  it  because  it  is 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped, 


147 


liable  to  do  more  barm  than  good.  It  will  report  a  hole  in 
the  fire  after  the  fireman  has  fixed  the  hole  and  it  will  report 
a  good  fire  when  there  are  in  fact  holes  that  need  stopping. 
This  is  due  to  the  necessary  time  interval  that  intervenes 
between  the  taking  of  the  gas  from  the  boiler  and  the  report 
on  that  gas  by  the  Recorder. 

I  repeat  that  the  functions  of  the  Recorder  are  those  of 
a  watchman.  Let  it  watch  the  fireman  for  you  and  let  the 
fireman  watch  his  fires.  If  he  does  that,  the  Recorder  will 
make  a  good  report  upon  him.  Watching  the  chart  of  the 
Recorder  will  assist  the  fireman  to  some  extent,  as  it  will 
show  him  the  result  of  what  he  did  some  minutes  ago.  In 
other  words,  it  will  enable  him  to  work  out  things  if  he  has 
the  intelligence  to  observe,  interpret  and  draw  conclusions. 
But  I  maintain  that  it  is  better  to  show  the  fireman,  by  means 
of  object  lessons  with  the  hand  Analyzer,  what  is  and  what 
is  not  a  proper  “fire,”  also  what  is  and  what  is  not  the  proper 
draft  for  that  fire.  Thereafter  let  the  fireman  watch  the  fires 
and  the  draft  gage  and  set  your  CO 2  Recorder  to  watch  him* 
This  will  keep  the  fireman  reasonably  busy  and  if  he  attends 
to  business  the  Recorder  will  have  a  good  report  to  make  upon 
him. 

There  should  be  one  CO2  Recorder  for  each  boiler,  but 
this  may  mean  more  of  an  expenditure  than  you  care  to  incur. 


2  3  4 


Arrangement  of  Piping  Enabling  One  Recorder  to  Serve  a 

Battery  of  Four  Boilers. 


348,  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


Qne .  Recorder  for  a  battery  of  boilers  may  prove  a  serious 
mistake,  unless  the  piping  is  so  arranged  that  the  firemen  will 
have  no  means  of  knowing  from  which  boiler  the  gas  is  being 
drawn.  Suppose  for  example,  that  you  were  a  fireman  and 
that,. you  knew  the  Recorder  to  be  working  on  the  gas  from 
Number  1  boiler.  In  spite  of  yourself  you  would  give  more 
attention  to  that  boiler  than  to  any  other  one.  You  would 
want  to  produce  a  good  chart  becouse  you  would  know  that 
the  Manager  and  Engineer  would  inspect  that  .chart.  But  if 
you  had  no  means  of  knowing  which  boiler  the  Recorder  might 
be  reporting  upon,  you  would  take  no  chances.  You  would 
give  the  same  attention  to  all  boilers,  and  doing  this  you  would 
be  sure  to  produce  a  good  chart. 

Your  Recorder  or  your  Gas  Collector  will  work  upon  but 
one  boiler  at  a  time.  If  you  have  several  boilers  in  operation 
and  ‘but  one  Recorder,  run  the  individual  gas  pipes  into  a 
common  header.  Place  a  valve  on  each  gas  pipe  near  the 
header  and  box  the  valves  in  such  a  way  that  the  firemen 
will  have  no  means  of  knowing  which  valve  is  open.  Then 
switch  the  Recorder  from  time  to  time  and  you  will  have  a 
reasonably  good  check  on  the  entire  plant,  though  not  so 
good  a  one  as  you  would  have  if  you  were  provided  with  a 
full  'equipment  of  Recorders. 

If  you  wish  to  establish  a  bonus  system  in  your  fire-room, 
and  such  a  system  always  brings  results  where  all  else  fails, 
an  equipment  of  Collectors  will  be  in  some  respects  better 
adapted  to  your  purpose  than  Recorders,  because  your 
bonuses  must  be  paid  on  averages  and  the  Collector  deals 
in  averages  at  the  expense  of  details,  whereas  the  Recorder 
deals  in  details  at  the  expense  of  averages.  You  can  get 
the  approximate  averages  by  running  a  planimeter  over  the 
Recorder  charts,  but  you  can  get  the  exact  average  within 
one-fifth  of  a  per  cent  CO2  by  analyzing  the  gas  trapped 
in  the  Collector.  When  using  the  Collectors  you  must  depend 
upon  someone  to  make  the  analyses.  If  that  person  turns  in 
false  reports,  either  designedly  or  otherwise,  your  bonus 
system  will  be  unfair  to  some  of  the  firemen  and  unfair  to 
yourself.  The  Recorder  will  turn  in  a  correct  report  within 
the  'limits  of  its  accuracy.  Surely  there  is  soneone  about 


Hoiv  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped.  '149 

your  plant  who  can  be  relied  upon  to  analyze  the  gas  taken 
by  the  Collectors.  If  the  man  to  whom  that  work  is  entrusted 
is  under  suspicion  a  trap  can  easily  be  set  for  him  and  if  he 
is  guilty  he  will  step  into  it.  * 

I  was  asked  for  advice  not  long  ago  by  a  plant  Manager. 
He  was  uncertain  whether  to  buy  Collectors  or  Recorders. 
I  stated  the  pros  and  cons  of  it  much  as  I  have  stated  them 
in  this  chapter.  He  said,  “We  are  wasting  so  much  fuel  lhat 
we  can  afford  to  do  this  thing  right.  I  shall  buy  a  Recorder 
for  each  boiler.”  ’ 

It  is  very  largely  a  matter  of  choice  whether  you  adopt 
Collectors  or  Recorders,  and  I  have  tried  to  set  forth 5  the 
facts  as  I  see  them  in  order  that  you  may  have  the  data  upon 
which  to  base  your  choice. 

The  reader  will  understand  that  in  my  discussion  of' the 
apparatus  required  for  combustion  analysis  I  am  not  depre¬ 
ciating  any  related  apparatus  by  my  failure  to  mention  it. 
Water  meters  and  steam  flow  meters  have  their  uses  in ‘the 
boiler  room.  The  same  may  be  said  of  recording  pyrometers 
and  other  apparatus.  The  further  such  apparatus  goes  in  the 
analysis  of  conditions  and  the  location  of  causes  the  irtore 

reason  there  is  for  its  presence.  ‘  ' 

• 

The  feed  water  meter  and  steam  flow  meter  talk  about 
capacity  without  relation  to  efficiency,  while  the  CO2  Re¬ 
corder  talks  about  efficiency  without  relation  to  capacity. 
There  is  no  way  that  the  one  form  of  apparatus  can  be 
substituted  for  the  other.  Some  men,  however,  are  so  'vio¬ 
lently  partisan  as  to  claim  that  an  arrangement  of  pyrometers; 
showing  the  temperature  drop  between  the  furnace  and*  the 
uptake  may  be  substituted  for  everything  else  that  I  have 
mentioned.  All  such  claims  as  these  are  absurd  and  instead 
of  boosting  any  particular  apparatus,  they  hurt  all  apparatus. 
It  is  better  to  stick  to  facts,  especially  when  the  facts1  are 
so  patent.  * 

I  have  included  a  thermometer  or  pyrometer  for  measur¬ 
ing  the  temperature  of  the  escaping  gases,  among  the  desir¬ 
able  testing  apparatus  for  the  boiler  room.  It  will  give  you 
more  information  on  boiler  efficiency  than  on  furnace 

•1 

efficiency.  For  this  reason  I  have  said  very  little  about 


150  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


temperatures  in  connection  with  the  flue  gases.  When  we 
have  done  all  that  it  is  possible  to  do  to  secure  economical 
combustion  it  is  then  up  to  the  boiler  to  take  the  heat  energy 
handed  to  it.  The  furnace  must  not  rob  the  boiler  by  turn¬ 
ing  cold  air  into  the  gases  or  by  sending  combustible  gas 
up  the  chimney.  When  the  furnace  can  show  that  it  has 
discharged  its  functions  properly,  the  boiler  is  responsible 
for  any  excess  temperature  that  the  escaping  gases  may  show. 
The  temperature  should  not  be  more  than  100  degrees  Fah¬ 
renheit  above  that  of  the  steam  in  the  boiler. 

Take  your  flue  gas  temperatures  at  the  point  where  the 
gases  leave  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler,  as  I  have 
already  advised.  I  sometimes  hear  engineers  boasting  about 
extremely  low  stack  temperatures  and  in  almost  every  case 
of  this  kind  I  have  found  that  the  temperatures  were  taken 
in  the  breeching  or  at  some  other  improper  point. 

And  now  let  me  briefly  recapitulate  the  steps  that  you 
must  take  to  substitute  economy  for  the  waste  that  is  ruling 
your  boiler  room. 

First,  you  must  get  yourself  “under  conviction  of  your 
sins,”  as  the  revivalist  wTould  express  it.  You  must  really 
T&ant  all  of  the  economy  that  is  coming  to  you  and  determine 
to  get  it. 

Second,  you  must  “diagnose”  your  waste  troubles  and  dis¬ 
cover  the  remedies  called  for. 

Third,  you  must  make  the  firemen  understand  what  is 
expected  of  them,  and  they  must  be  convinced  that  your 
contentions  are  right.  If  the  fireman  does  not  agree  with 
you  on  any  subject  relating  to  the  management  of  the  fires 
you  must  convince  him  that  you  are  right  and  he  is  wrong. 
This  is  easy. 

In  a  big  Eastern  power  plant  there  is  a  negro  fireman  who 
rejoices  in  the  nickname  of  “Happy.”  He  was  persuaded 
that  he  was  some  fireman  and  it  would  have  been  impossible 
to  argue  him  out  of  that  hallucination.  The  Chief  Engineer 
had  tried  arguments  without  success.  He  decided  to  give 
“Happy”  an  object  lesson  and  as  the  man  was  looked  upon 
as  an  expert  by  the  other  negro  firemen  the  Chief  considered 
the  object  lesson  as  of  sufficient  importance  to  warrant  a 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


151 


couple  of  evaporative  tests. 

A  ten-hour  test  was  run  with  “Happy”  as  fireman  and 
he  was  instructed  to  do  his  “darndest”  as  they  were  trying 
for  a  record.  The  man  was  allowed  to  fire  in  his  own  way 
and  he  was  a  tired  man  at  the  end  of  the  day. 

On  the  following  morning  the  Chief  Engineer  said: 
“Happy,  we  are  going  to  run  another  test  today  and  you  are 
going  to  fire  again.  You  fired  your  way  yesterday  and  today 
you  are  going  to  fire  my  way.  I  shall  stay  with  you  and  you 
will  fire  exactly  as  I  say.  We  will  not  stop  the  test  until 
we  have  evaporated  as  much  water  as  we  did  yesterday.” 

The  test  was  conducted  under  this  arrangement,  and  it 
was  concluded  at  the  end  of  nine  hours.  The  Chief  then 
pointed  to  the  large  pile  of  coal  that  was  left  and  said: 
“Happy,  what  would  you  think  of  a  fireman  who  would  steal 
that  amount  of  coal  from  his  employer?”  “Why,”  said  Happy, 
“Ah  nevah  stole  no  coal  from  this  company.  Ah  nevah  stole 
no  coal  from  nobody.”  “I  know  it,”  said  the  Chief,  “but  you 
have  wasted  coal  every  day  and  wasting  coal  is  worse  than 
stealing  it,  because  nobody  gets  any  use  of  fuel  that  is  wasted. 
We  evaporated  as  much  water  today  as  we  evaporated  yester¬ 
day.  We  have  an  hour  to  spare  and  as  much  coal  to  spare 
as  you  see  lying  on  the  floor.”  “Is  you  sure  about  the  evap¬ 
oration?”  said  “Happy.”  “Why  Ah  worked  like  a  niggah 
yesterday  and  today  Ah  hardly  worked  at  all.  Ah  didn’t  sup¬ 
pose  the  boiler  was  doing  anything.”  “Happy”  was  convinced 
and  ready  to  take  instructions  where  before  he  would  accept 
instructions  from  nobody.  Today  he  is  said  to  be  one  of  the 
most  expert  firemen  in  the  city  of  Pittsburgh. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  run  an  evaporative  test  to  give  your 
fireman  an  object  lesson.  You  can  give  very  convincing 
lessons  with  the  “spotting”  apparatus  I  have  mentioned. 

For  the  fourth  step  you  must  institute  a  checking  system 
in  your  plant  as  already  suggested  and  the  fifth  and  final 
step  is  taken  when  the  incentive  for  ultimate  effort  is  given 
by  a  bonus  system,  or  otherwise. 

I  have  never  known  a  bonus  system  to  fail  of  the  most 
gratifying  results.  I  know  of  nothing  upon  which  you  can 
base  a  more  equitable  bonus  system  than  the  CO2  averages. 


152  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


From  the  tables  given  you  can  arrange  a  bonus  schedule  to 
suit  yourself.  Make  your  firemen  stockholders  in  your 
economy  enterprise  and  they  will  work  their  shirts  off  to 
earn  dividends.  And  as  a  gratifying  by-product  of  your 
bonus  system,  your  firemen  will  be  anchored  at  your  plant. 
You  know  what  it  means  to  have  firemen  quit  when  firemen 
are  hard  to  get. 

I  have  talked  with  the  Managers  of  many  plants  where 
bonus  systems  are  in  force  and  I  have  yet  to  find  one  who  is 
dissatisfied  with  the  results.  The  firemen  are  always  happy. 
In  most  cases  the  rule  is  to  distribute  about  one-tenth  of  the 
money  saved  among  the  men  saving  it,  the  distribution  to  be 
pro  rata  according  to  each  man’s  efficiency.  The  savings  are 
figured  from  the  CO2  percentages.  In  some  cases  these  per¬ 
centages  are  checked  by  the  coal  and  kilowatt  records.  When 
the  figures  fail  to  check  it  is  assumed  that  something  is  wrong 
with  the  boilers  proper  or  that  something  requires  attention 
in  the  engine  room.  When  the  COo  reports  are  right  it  is 
known  that  the  firemen  and  the  furnaces  are  not  to  blame 
for  any  slip  in  efficiency  that  may  be  indicated  by  the  coal 
and  kilowatt  records. 

The  operating  men  in  the  power  plant  have  the  last 
word  to  say  on  the  subject  of  efficiency.  No  matter  how  good 
the  physical  state  of  the  plant  may  be  or  how  complete  the 
equipment  there  will  be  efficiency  in  proportion  to  the 
interest,  intelligence,  fidelity  and  close  attention  to  duty  of 
the  operating  force.  Anything  that  tends  to  stimulate  the 
men  in  these  particulars  will  improve  efficiency.  Anything 
that  works  in  the  opposite  direction  will  have  the  opposite 
effect.  It  is  a  case  of  dealing  with  human  nature. 

Give  the  men  an  incentive.  It  may  consist  of  a  pecuniary 
reward,  the  hope  of  promotion,  the  fear  of  discharge,  a  spirit 
of  rivalry  or  anything  else  that  will  supply  a  moving  interest 
in  the  work. 

Whatever  the  incentive  may  be  there  must  be  some  fair 
and  equitable  means  of  comparing  the  work  of  one  man  with 
that  of  another.  Various  means  have  been  employed  in 
different  power  plants  with  varying  degrees  of  success.  The 
following  “yard  sticks”  have  been  used  to  measure  efficiency: 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


153 


1.  Coal  consumption. 

2.  Evaporation. 

3.  Factory  output  in  relation  to  coal  consumption. 

4.  Combustion  efficiency. 

The  coal  consumption  depends : 

(a)  Upon  combustion  efficiency;  (b)  the  quality  of  the 
fuel;  (c)  efficiency  of  the  furnace  as  a  furnace;  (d)  efficiency 
of  the  boiler  as  a  boiler;  (e)  co-ordination  of  furnace  and 
boiler;  (f)  physical  conditions  of  furnace  and  boiler;  (g) 
efficiency  in  the  use  of  steam;  (h)  efficiency  in  the  distribu¬ 
tion  of  steam;  (i)  efficiency  of  engines,  generators,  factory 
machinery,  etc.;  (j)  the  load  on  the  power  plant. 

The  evaporation  per  pound  of  coal  burned  and  the  coal 
cost  per  unit  of  factory  output  depend  upon  the  same  mis¬ 
cellaneous  aggregation  of  factors  as  the  coal  consumption. 
So  far  as  my  information  goes  it  has  never  proved  feasible 
to  measure  out  bonuses  of  any  kind  with  ony  one  of  the  three 
“yard  sticks”  first  mentioned,  because  it  is  impossible  to 
definitely  fix  and  measure  responsibility  with  such  means  of 
measurement.  The  fireman  may  blame  the  coal,  the  boilers, 
the  load  or  the  wastes  in  the  plant.  He  is  sure  to  place  the 
responsibility  anywhere  but  upon  his  own  shoulders.  To  rate 
the  efficiency  of  anybody  in  the  power  department  by  coal 
consumption,  evaporation  or  factory  output  would  require 
considerable  testing  apparatus,  a  great  deal  of  time,  book¬ 
keeping  and  other  expense. 

Looking  into  the  bonus  problem  further  the  following 
facts  become  apparent: 

1.  The  plant  must  be  operated  with  the  equipment  that 
it  possesses.  If  the  furnaces  and  boilers  are  misfits  or  other¬ 
wise  not  adapted,  they  must  be  used,  nevertheless,  until  the 
plant  is  remodeled  or  reconstructed.  The  firemen  and 
engineers  are  not  responsible  for  the  equipment  because  they 
did  not  select  it. 

2.  If  the  equipment  is  in  bad  physical  condition  the  men 
who  burn  the  coal  cannot  as  a  rule  be  held  responsible. 

3;  If  steam  is  wasted  in  the  plant  the  firemen  are  not  at 
all  responsible.  The  engineers  may  or  may  not  be  responsible. 


154  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


4.  If  the  load  varies  the  engineers  and  firemen  are  not 
responsible.  They  must  meet  the  load  as  it  comes. 

5.  If  a  poor  quality  of  fuel  is  furnished  the  engineers 
and  firemen  are  not  to  blame. 

The  fireman  is  responsible  for  combustion  efficiency  and 
for  no  other  sort  of  efficiency.  Such  efficiency  depends  sec¬ 
ondarily  upon  the  coal  and  the  physical  state  of  the  furnace 
and  boiler  settings.  It  depends  to  some  extent  upon  the  fur¬ 
nace  itself,  of  which  the  grate  is  a  part.  All  of  the  factors 
which  tend  to  complicate  the  question  of  responsibility  for 
combustion  efficiency  may  be  eliminated  in  the  following 
manner: 

1st.  The  boilers  and  furnaces  should  first  be  put  in  a 
good  state  of  repair — particular  attention  being  given  to  the 
brick  work  and  the  baffles.  It  should  be  remembered,  also, 
that  there  is  no  excuse  for  soot  and  scale. 

Someone,  preferably  the  engineer-in-charge,  should  be 
made  responsible  for  the  up-keep  of  the  steam  generating 
equipment.  A  signed  daily  report,  covering  such  details  as  it 
is  necessary  to  observe  in  maintaining  the  physical  state  of 
the  plant,  should  be  required  and  all  the  material  and  help 
necessary  for  proper  up-keep  should  be  furnished  to  the 
responsible  party.  When  these  things  are  done  proper  up¬ 
keep  will  be  assured  and  it  will  not  be  assured  until  they 
are  done. 

Don’t  take  it  for  granted  that  your  plant  is  in  first  class 
shape.  Make  sure  of  it.  Just  assume  that  your  coal  bills 
are  too  high  and  look  for  the  reasons.  You  will  find  that 
they  are  too  high. 

2nd.  Select  the  coal  that  is  best  adapted  to  the  furnace 
and  the  general  conditions  affecting  the  plant.  The  coal  will 
vary  in  quality  to  some  extent  but  probably  not  enough  to 
affect  the  efficiency  of  combustion. 

3rd.  Having  put  the  equipment  in  good  condition  and 
insured  the  proper  daily  care  of  it,  a  standard  of  operating 
combustion  efficiency  may  be  established. 

If  with  the  furnaces  you  have  and  the  coal  you  have 
selected  an  average  of  14  per  cent  CO2  may  be  maintained  by 
proper  stoking  and  the  use  of  the  proper  drafts,  let  14 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


155 


per  cent  be  the  standard.  Should  the  coal  he  of  low  grade, 
high  in  ash,  14  per  cent  may  be  too  high.  You  can  easily 
ascertain  what  the  top-notch  figure  may  be. 

When  the  above  three  things  are  done  and  the  necessary 
apparatus  provided,  a  bonus  system  may  be  established  for 
the  firemen.  If  considered  advisable,  the  engineers  who  have 
supervising  charge  of  the  firemen,  may  be  included  in  the 
benefits  of  the  bonus. 

WHEN  THE  BOILERS  AND  FURNACES  ARE  IN 
PROPER  CONDITION  THE  EFFICIENCY  OF  THE  MEN 
IN  CHARGE  OF  THE  FURNACES  IS  A  CLOSE  MEASURE 
OF  THE  EFFICIENCY  WITH  WHICH  THE  STEAM  IS 
GENERATED. 

For  the  various  reasons  above  given  it  is  argued  that  the 
only  sensible  basis  upon  which  to  place  a  Bonus  System  is 
COMBUSTION  EFFICIENCY.  Fortunately  the  means  for  de¬ 
termining  such  efficiency  and  for  definitely  rating  each  watch 
and  each  man  are  simple  and  easily  applied.  It  is  merely 
necessary  to  know  the  percentage  of  CO  2  produced  by  each 
furnace  during  each  watch.  An  occasional  check  should  be 
made  to  determine  the  presence  of  CO. 

To  make  clear  how  a  bonus  system  may  be  placed  in  oper¬ 
ation  let  us  assume  that  we  are  applying  it  to  your  plant. 
It  is  presumed  that  in  overhauling  the  plant  the  boiler 
dampers  and  damper  controls  received  proper  attention  and 
that  a  draft  gage  has  been  provided  for  each  boiler  furnace. 
Efficiency  depends  to  a  great  extent  upon  the  use  of  the 
proper  draft  and  it  would  be  idle  to  tell  the  firemen  that  they 
must  use  certain  specified  drafts  over  the  fires  if  you  have 
not  provided  them  with  the  means  of  continually  measuring 
drafts. 

In  fixing  upon  a  standard  of  furnace  operation  you  must 
determine: 

1st.  How  thick  the  fuel  should  be  carried  on  the  grates. 

2nd.  What  draft  to  use  for  the  normal  load  and  how  the 
draft  should  be  varied  to  take  care  of  changes  in  the  load. 

3rd.  Methods  of  firing  or  of  operating  the  stokers  to 
avoid  faults  in  the  fuel  bed  and  to  keep  the  fuel  constantly 
at  the  right  depth  upon  the  grates. 


156  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


4th.  Proper  methods  of  using  the  fire  tools,  particularly 
the  slice-bar. 

5th.  Proper  methods  of  cleaning  the  fires. 

6th.  Proper  methods  of  banking  fires. 

It  may  take  all  of  a  day  or  perhaps  two  days  to  work 
out  the  various  problems  as  it  will  be  necessary  to  make  sure 
that  no  mistakes  are  being  made  in  the  diagnosis. 

Following  the  study  as  outlined  above  it  will  be  necessary 
to  instruct  each  of  the  firemen  and  to  make  sure  that  all  of 
the  instructions  are  understood. 

Following  this  it  will  be  necessary  to  know  the  average 
percentage  of  CO-2  produced  each  watch  by  each  boiler  fur¬ 
nace.  Knowing  this  it  will  be  easy. 

1st.  To  rate  the  firemen  according  to  combustion  ef 
ficiency. 

2nd.  To  determine  the  quantity  of  fuel  heedlessly  wasted 
and  who  wasted  it. 

3rd.  To  compute  the  bonuses  and  make  the  prope: 
awards. 

The  bonus  schedule  may  be  whatever  you  wish  to  make  it. 
The  maximum  premium  need  not  exceed  50  cents  per  day. 
It  will  be  necessary  to  fix  upon  some  percentage  of  CO2  as 
a  base  and  to  apply  the  schedule  upon  percentages  above 
that  base. 

The  bonus  system  is  the  one  sensible  method  of  increasing 
the  fireman’s  pay  without  feeling  it.  The  fireman,  himself, 
produces  the  money  from  which  the  premiums  are  paid. 

The  Manager  of  a  plant  on  the  Texas  border,  who  employs 
Mexicans  as  firemen,  writes  as  follows: 

“I  offer  each  man  a  bonus  of  five  per  cent  of  the  fuel  that 
he  can  save  and  the  effect  has  been  magical.  The  men  come 
to  me  and  in  their  broken  English  try  to  explain  how  hard 
they  are  trying  to  carry  out  my  instructions.” 

“Each  man  received  a  bonus  of  $3.75  the  first  month,  $2.50 
the  second  month,  $3.30  the  third  and  $7.80  the  fourth.  The 
plant  was  only  running  half  the  time  the  first  three  months 
and  from  all  indications  the  bonus  will  be  from  seven  to  ten 
dollars  per  month  in  the  future. 

“In  four  months  each  man  had  received  $17.35  extra  pay 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


157 


and  the  fuel  account  was  benefitted  by  a  saving  of  $312.30, 
which  was  all  ‘velvet’  as  no  money  had  been  invested  by  the 
company  to  accomplish  the  saving. 

“After  this  experience  I  firmly  believe  that  this  is  the  only 
way  to  handle  firemen.  It  is  simply  a  case  of  deciding 
whether  the  money  is  to.be  given  to  the  fuel  dealer  or  divided 
between  the  men  and  the  company.” 

An  Eastern  plant  adopted  the  bonus  system  and  saved  30 
per  cent  on  its  fuel  the  first  year.  The  men  were  paid  10  per 
cent  of  the  saving  effected,  leaving  the  company  a  net  saving 
of  27  per  cent  with  no  investment  whatever  except  the  small 
amount  required  for  CO2  apparatus. 

The  bonus  schedule  in  force  in  this  plant  is  as  follows: 

Per  cent  CO2.  Premium  per  day. 


12 

$0.75 

11.5 

.70 

11 

.65 

10.5 

.60 

10 

.55 

9.5 

.50 

9 

.45 

8.5 

.40 

8 

.35 

7.5 

.30 

7 

.25 

6.5 

.20 

6 

.15 

The  Manager  of  another  Eastern  factory  writes  me  as 
follows  concerning  his  bonus  system: 

“In  order  to  get  the  very  best  results  and  the  most  eco¬ 
nomical  method  of  firing  we  are  paying  a  bonus  to  the  fireman 
who  is  on  watch  from  4  A.  M.  to  12  Noon  and  from  12  Noon  to 
S  P.  M.  on  all  days  when  the  factory  is  in  full  operation.  We 
pay  bonus  as  follows: 

“For  10%  CO2,  10c;  for  11%,  15c;  for  12%,  25c;  and  for 
13%,  40c.  In  addition  to  this  we  pay  $2.00  extra  each  month 
to  the  fireman  making  the  highest  average  the  month. 

“In  order  to  show  you  what  we  are  doing  I  enclose  here¬ 
with  a  copy  of  our  record  for  the  month  of  June. 


158  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


RECORD  OF  C02  PERCENTAGE 
Month  of  June,  1913 
FIREMEN 


C02  PCT.  Bonus 


1 

C.  O.  Bolin 

Jno.  Zigalinski 

Peter  Rynice 

J. . 

2 . 

.  .  .  12. 

.25 

11.2 

•  •  •  • 

.15 

3  . 

. . .  10.6 

.10 

11. 

.15 

4 . 

. . .  10. 

.10 

10.2 

.10 

5 . 

.  .  .  11.1 

.15 

10.4 

.10 

6 . 

. . .  11.6 

.15 

11. 

.15 

7 . 

10.6 

.10 

8 . 

•  •  •  • 

9 . 

12. 

.23 

12.6 

.25 

10 . 

11.6 

.  15 

12.6 

.25 

11 . 

12. 

.25 

12.8 

.25 

12 . 

13.2 

.40 

12.8 

.25 

13 . 

12.9 

.25 

11.9 

.15 

14 . 

12.4 

.25 

15 . 

»  •  •  • 

16 . 

. . .  12.3 

.25 

12.7 

.25 

•  •  •  • 

17 . 

. . .  10.8 

.10 

12.8 

.25 

•  •  •  • 

18 . 

. . .  12.2 

.25 

12. 

.25 

•  •  •  • 

19 . 

. . .  12. 

.25 

11.6 

.  15 

20 . 

. . .  12.2 

.25 

12.4 

.25 

•  •  •  • 

21 . 

. . .  12. 

.25 

22 . 

23 . 

. .  .  12.2 

.25 

12. 

.25 

24 . 

. . .  13. 

.40 

11. 

.15 

25 . 

. . .  12. 

.25 

11.7 

.15 

26 . 

. . .  11.6 

.15 

11.7 

.15 

27 . 

. . .  11.6 

.15 

11.4 

.15 

28 . 

11.8 

.15 

29 . 

•  •  •  • 

•  •  •  • 

30 . 

•  •  •  • 

1.2 . 4 

.25 

12.7 

.25 

31- . 

•  ■  •  • 

•  •  • 

•  •  •  • 

Totals . 

.. .187.2 

$3.30 

148. 

$2.95 

208.8 

$3.15 

Averages  .  . 

. . .  11.7 

12.3 

11.6 

Jno.  Zigalinski,  extra  bonus  for  best  avertge,  $2.00. 


“We  employ  three  firemen  and  one  only  is  on  watch  at  a 
time,  which  is  8  hours  on  watch  and  16  hours  off.  On  Sun¬ 
days  the  length  of  the  watch  is  changed  so  that  the  same  man 
will  not  always  be  on  the  same  watch.  We  are  burning  at 
this  time  of  the  year  about  12  tons  Bit.  coal  every  24  hours, 
the  cost  of  same  is  $3.35  per  ton  in  the  bin,  and  since  we 
started  to  pay  bonus  the  percentage  of  CO2  is  higher  and  we 
know  that  our  firemen  are  doing  the  best  they  can  to  get  the 
best  result,  and  we  know  that  by  the  bonus  system  and  the 
regular  use  of  CO2  apparatus  we  have  reduced  the  coal  con¬ 
sumption  in  our  boiler  room.” 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


159 


The  Troubles  and  Triumphs  of 
“Rastus  Brown” 


A  BONUS  STORY  IN  FOUR  CHAPTERS. 

INTRODUCTION.  . 

A  Southern  plant  purchased  CO2  apparatus  and  in  order 
to  induce  the  best  efforts  of  its  firemen  offered  a  crate  of  pul¬ 
lets  each  month  to  the  man  making  the  best  CO2  average. 
The  story  relates  the  experiences  of  Erastus,  one  of  the 
firemen. 

CHAPTER  I. 


MAH  60LLY-  SOME  PULLETS,  SOME  PULLETS 


“Now  watch  dis  IViggah  make  See  Oh  Two 
Case  Ah  wants  dem  pullets  foil  a  chicken  stew.” 


160 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency 


CHAPTER  II. 


I 


But  he  took  no  pullets  home  to  his  larder 
Because  another  fireman  ‘‘tried  a  little  harder/' 


Blanche:  lavs  down  a  barrage  firf  of 

flat  I  RONS,  T  EA  CUPS,  AN  D  ROLLING  PINS 


The  stove  was  ready,  likewise  the  pot. 

But  there  were  no  chickens  and  Blanche  got  hot 
Then  she  broke  some  crockery  on  his  bean 
And  ‘Rastus  left  for  a  friendlier  scene. 


CHAPTER  III. 


“Got  to  git  dat  bonus  and  de  pullets  now 
Or  I  dassent  go  home,  no  more,  no  how.” 


How  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped 


161 


CHAPTER  IV. 


The  smile  that  ffrew  on  ’Rastus  Brown 
The  day  he  pulled  the  bonus  down. 


162  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


In  a  preceding  chapter  I  have  suggested  a  form  for  a 
daily  report  upon  boiler  room  maintenance.  The  theory  is 
that  when  a  signed  report  is  required  the  chances  of  effective 
supervision  are  increased. 

The  daily  “Records  of  Operation”  should  cover,  when 
possible,  all  of  the  items  shown  on  the  following  chart: 

The  things  that  I  have  suggested  in  this  book  may  mean 
a  little  initial  expense  to  the  management.  They  cannot 
mean  much  and  it  is  just  a  question  whether  you  will  spend 
a  little  money  for  the  apparatus  that  your  engineer  needs  or 
give  a  great  deal  of  money  to  the  coal  dealer.  They  mean  a 
little  extra  trouble  for  the  engineer,  but  a  reasonable  amount 
of  trouble  is  a  good  thing  for  an  engineer.  It  keeps  him 
from  brooding  on  being  an  engineer. 


RECORDS  OF  OPERATION 

Date 

WATCH 

FIREMEN 

COAL 

TOTAL 

ASH 

TOTAL 

COz 

AVGE 

DRAFT 

STACK 

TEMP 

FEED'* 

ENTER 

VATER 

LEAVE 

WATER  1 

evaporated] 

1 

- 

\ 

. 

2 

- 

3 

TOTALS  ^AVERAGES 

~::r  ~ 

Rem. 

ARKS 

OPERATING  ENGINEER 

Hoiv  to  Keep  the  Wastes  Stopped. 


16 


>o 

O 


Showing  installation  of  Gas  Collectors  in  a 
plant  where  records  of  the  daily  COz  averages 
of  each  fireman  are  kept. 


C02  Recorders  are  used  in  many  plants,— one 
for  each  boiler— the  firemen’s  averages  being 
taken  from  the  charts. 


164  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

Appendix. 

OIL,  GAS,  WOOD  REFUSE  AND  OTHER  FUELS. 

When  Oxygen  meets  Carbon,  Hydrogen,  Sulphur  or  other 
combustible  in  the  presence  of  heat,  chemical  union  occurs 
and  what  is  known  as  “combustion”  takes  place.  Heat  results. 
This  is  the  whole  story  and  it  makes  little  difference  what 
the  combustible  may  be. 

The  rapidity  with  which  combustion  takes  place  depends 
upon  the  ease  with  which  the  Oxygen  and  the  combustible 
find  each  other.  The  more  intimately  the  two  are  mixed  before 
ignition  the  more  complete  and  the  more  rapid  the  combustion 
will  be.  The  combustion  of  gun-powder  is  practically  instan¬ 
taneous  because  the  Oxygen  producing  substances  are  thor¬ 
oughly  mixed  with  the  powdered  combustible  matter. 

When  we  place  coal  in  the  furnace  in  large  lumps  the 
Oxygen  can  act  only  upon  the  surfaces  of  the  lumps.  It  can¬ 
not  have  contact  with  the  combustible  below  the  surface  until 
the  lumps  have  disintegrated  and  provided  surface  exposure. 
It  follows,  therefore,  that  the  lumpier  the  coal  the  greater  the 
excess  of  air  that  we  are  likely  to  send  through  the  furnace. 
Conditions  are  best  for  efficiency,  as  I  have  tried  to  show  in 
preceding  chapters,  when  the  fuel  is  completely  burned  with 
the  least  possible  excess  of  air. 

Now,  when  we  break  the  coal  up  into  small  particles,  it 
is  evident  that  we  greatly  increase  the  surface  exposure, 
thereby  increasing  the  rate  of  combustion  and  decreasing  the 
volume  of  air  that  it  is  necessary  to  force  through  the  furnace. 
When  we  grind  the  coal  to  a  fine  dry  powder,  mix  it  with 
air  and  blow  it  into  the  furnace,  it  burns  like  gas  or  oil.  The 
resulting  temperature  is  extremely  high  owing  to  the  rapidity 
of  combustion  which,  in  turn,  is  owing  to  the  infinite  surface 
exposure  of  the  fuel  particles.  Dust,  when  suspended  in  air, 
•is  quite  as  explosive  as  gas  when  mixed  with  air.  Internal 
combustion  engines  have  actually  been  run  experimentally 
upon  powdered  coal. 

The  author  receives  many  letters  from  engineers  and 
others  asking  if  the  methods  he  has  suggested  will  apply 


Appendix. 


165 


to  oil,  gas  and  wood  refuse  when  burned  for  power.  Of  course, 
they  will.  Why  not?  Combustion  is  combustion. 

Considerable  has  been  said  in  the  preceding  chapters 
about  the  importance  of  excluding  all  unnecessary  air  from 
the  furnace  and  of  preventing  all  air  from  flowing  in  upon  the 
heating  surfaces  through  faults  in  the  setting,  etc.  This  de¬ 
sideratum  is  of  universal  application  regardless  of  the  fuel. 

It  is  necessary  that  the  fuel  and  the  air  be  supplied  to  the 
furnace  in  right  quantities  and  the  right  manner.  This  is 
true  of  coal  and  it  is  doubly  true  of  the  powdered,  liquid  and 
gaseous  fuels. 

Draft  is  a  vital  factor  in  efficiency  when  a  solid  fuel  is 
being  burned.  It  is  doubly  vital  in  the  case  of  oil  and  gas. 

It  is  possible  to  so  adjust  the  oil  or  gas  burner  that  the 
mixture  will  be  constant  as  long  as  the  drafts,  pressures  and 
atmospheric  conditions  are  constant.  It  is  impossible  to  main¬ 
tain  anything  better  than  approximately  constant  conditions 
in  the  coal  burning  furnace.  The  most  automatic  type  of 
automatic  stoker  requires  some  attention.  While  the  general 
principles  governing  economical  combustion  are  the  same, 
regardless  of  the  fuel,  and  while  the  general  methods  of  insur¬ 
ing  combustion  control  have  general  application,  it  is  plain 
that  stress  must  be  laid  upon  certain  of  the  methods  when  we 
are  burning  a  solid  and  upon  others  when  we  are  burning  a 
fluid.  And  when  we  are  dealing  exclusively  with  coals  it  must 
be  remembered  that  no  two  coals  can  be  properly  treated  by 
following  the  same  routine.  For  example:  A  caking  coal 
requires  frequent  raking  to  break  up  the  solid  masses  of 
coke  which  form  in  the  furnace.  A  non-caking  coal  should 
never  be  raked  at  all.  A  high  volatile  coal  requires  the  admis¬ 
sion  of  air  over  the  fire  as  well  as  through  the  grate,  while  a 
low  volatile  coal  may  take  its  entire  air  supply  through  the 
grate.  Some  coals  call  for  a  thick  bed  of  fuel  and  others  for 
a  thinner  bed.  Some  may  be  burned  at  a  very  high  tempera¬ 
ture  and  others,  owing  to  the  fusing  properties  of  the  ash, 
must  be  burned  at  much  lower  temperatures.  Fine  coals 
usually  give  the  best  results  when  burned  wet  and  coarse 
coals  when  burned  dry.  It  is  unhappily  impossible  to  lay 


166  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

down  an  exact  set  of  rules  for  burning  coal.  The  details  must 
be  varied  to  suit  the  circumstances. 

THE  FUEL  IS  BURNED  MOST  EFFICIENTLY  WHEN 
IT  IS  COMPLETELY  CONSUMED  WITH  THE  LEAST 
SURPLUS  OF  AIR.  This  rule  applies  alike  to  the  two 
extremes  of  anthracite  coal  and  natural  gas;  it  goes  with 
fuels  of  all  descriptions. 

The  reader  will  note  from  the  table,  page  105,  and  the 
chart,  page  107,  both  of  which  are  based  upon  pure  Carbon 
fuel,  that  the  indicated  fuel  loss  grows  less  and  less  per 
increment  of  CO2  as  we  ascend  the  scale  toward  the  theoret¬ 
ical  maximum.  A  small  fraction  of  a  per  cent  in  the  lower 
ranges  of  the  scale  means  more  than  a  whole  per  cent  in  the 
higher  ranges.  Note  the  table  following: 

Improvement  in  CCL.  Indicated  Fuel  Saving. 

From  2  per  cent  to  3  per  cent  27.72  per  cent 


(( 

3 

if 

i  a 

4 

ti  a 

14.00 

it 

tt 

4 

ft 

i  if 

5 

ft  if 

8.49 

it 

it 

5 

t  < 

t  tc 

6 

a  a 

5.70 

tt 

ft 

6 

ft 

t  n 

7 

it  ft 

4.07 

tt 

ft 

7 

if 

t  if 

8 

it  it 

3.36 

it 

it 

8 

ft 

i  if 

9 

a  a 

2.08 

it 

it 

9 

t  f 

f  if 

10 

tt  it 

1.89 

it 

*•' 

10 

it 

t  a 

11 

it  it 

1.56 

it 

it 

11 

it 

i  a 

12 

it  tt 

1.29 

ti 

it 

12 

i  t 

t  if 

13 

a  a 

1.09 

tt 

it 

13 

it 

f  a 

14 

tt  tt 

.94 

it 

if 

14 

i  i 

t  n 

15 

it  it 

.80 

it 

The  author  has  been  asked  many  times,  “What  percentage 
of  CO2  in  the  gases  of  combustion  indicates  the  highest 
efficiency  when  the  fuel  is  fuel  oil?”  The  same  question  has 
been  asked  regarding  natural  gas,  wood  refuse  and  other 
fuels. 

The  terms  “coal,”  “fuel  oil,”  etc.,  are  general  terms  only. 
Coal  may  range  from  almost  straight  Carbon  with  only  a 
trace  of  volatile  matter  to  a  fuel  that  is  more  than  50  per 
cent  volatile  matter.  It  may  contain  all  the  way  from  a  trace 
of  Sulphur  to  as  much  as  10  per  cent  or  more.  There  are 
wide  variations  in  fuel  oil  and  in  natural  gas.  Before  being 


Appendix . 


167 


able  to  say  exactly  how  the  gases  of  combustion  should  an¬ 
alyze  it  is  necessary  to  know  how  the  fuel  analyzes. 

The  table  on  page  105  is  strictly  arbitrary  because  it 
assumes  a  fuel  and  an  uptake  temperature.  It  also  assumes 
that  it  is  not  safe  in  practice,  and  therefore  not  good  practice, 
to  court  more  than  15  per  cent  C02  on  account  of  the  diffi¬ 
culties  with  CO.  I  have  seen  as  high  as  18.6  per  cent  CO- 
without  a  trace  of  CO  but  that  condition  was  sustained  for 
only  a  few  moments.  You  will  do  well  to  maintain  an  aver¬ 
age  of  15  per  cent  without  suffering  incomplete  combustion 
and  I  have  therefore  selected  that  figure  as  the  top-notch  of 
practical  perfection  with  high-carbon  coal.  You  should  be 
highly  pleased  with  an  average  of  14  per  cent  and  satisfied 
with  an  average  of  13. 


But  what  about  the  other  fuels?  The  following  table 
assumes  averages  of  bituminous  coal,  fuel  oil  and  natural  gas. 


Per  cent 

Per  cent 

Per  cent 

Fuel 

Theoretical  C02. 

Practical  C02. 

Air  Excess. 

Straight  Carbon 

20.7 

15.0 

38 

Fuel  Oil 

15.0 

14.0 

7 

Bituminous  Coal 

17.9 

14.0 

28 

Natural  Gas 

11.9 

11.0 

8 

For  wood  and  “bagasse”  the  figures  given  for  bituminous 
coal  may  be  taken. 

It  is  easier  to  mix  air  with  gas  than  it  is  to  mix  it  with 
coal  unless  the  coal  is  crushed  to  an  impalpable  powder.  A 
high  volatile  coal  burns  more  freely  than  a  high  Carbon  coal. 
These  facts  serve  to  explain  the  differences  in  the  excess  air 
required. 

The  diagrams,  1  to  VII,  serve  to  show  the  results  of  the 
reactions  in  the  boiler  furnace  when  various  fuels  are  burned. 
It  will  be  observed  that  as  the  percentage  of  Hydrogen  in 
the  fuel  increases  the  percentage  of  C02  in  the  flue  gases 
decreases.  The  foot  notes  should  make  the  meaning  of  the 
diagrams  clear. 

Combustion  analysis  may  be  employed  to  check  up  an  in¬ 
ternal  combustion  engine  as  well  as  a  boiler  furnace.  The 
theoretical  percentage  of  C02  resulting  from  the  combustion 
of  high  grade  gasoline  is  14.2  and  of  kerosene  14.4.  In  good 


168  Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


Air  Entering  the  Furnace 

Diagram  I. 


II 

777 

m 

'/yy/ 

/  /  /  /  / 

777// 

if 

i 

I 

IP 

i 

1 

i 

Y/y/l 

7/7/ 

7/, 

m 

f77 7 

^1 

i 

A 

/  /rog 

cn 

C02 

In  a/r-^ 

Air  entering  the  furnace  contains  20.7  per  cent  by  volume 
(usually)  of  Free  Oxygen  and  79  per  cent  plus  of  Nitrogen. 
Normal  air  carries  about  four  one  hundredths  of  one  per  cent 
C02  and  minute  quantities  of  the  rare  gases.  Argon,  Helium, 
Krypton,  Neon  and  Xenon.  The  latter  are  all  classed  with 
Nitrogen  in  gas  analysis. 

practice  it  is  possible  to  secure  as  high  as  13.5  per  cent  COo 
without  CO. 

To  secure  a  gas  sample  from  an  automobile  or  other  in¬ 
ternal  combustion  engine  the  exhaust  manifold  should  b« 
tapped  at  a  point  where  a  mixture  of  the  exhaust  from  all 


Appendix. 


169 


Gases  Leaving  the  Furnace 

Diagram  II. 

(Theoretical  diagram  based  upon  pure  Carbon  fuel) 


Theoretical  Percentage  of  C02,  110.7. 


When  Oxygen  combines  with  Carbon  to  produce  complete  com¬ 
bustion  the  gas,  COo,  results — the  volume  of  the  gas  pro¬ 
duced  exactly  equalling  the  volume  of  the  Oxygen  used  under 
like  conditions  of  temperature  and  pressure.  If  straight 
Carbon  could  be  burned  under  theoretical  conditions  the 
gases  would  carry  20.7  per  cent  COo  as  shown  by  the  above 
diagram.  Such  a  result  cannot  be  attained  in  actual  practice. 

of  the  cylinders  will  be  insured.  As  the  loads  and  speeds 

vary  different  mixtures  are  required.  The  carburetor  should 

be  adjusted  for  normal  conditions  of  operation  and  it  can  be 

adjusted  with  the  utmost  accuracy  if  the  exhaust  gases  are 

examined. 


170  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


Gases 'Leaving  the  Furnace 

Diagram  III. 

(The  diagram  assumes  a  straight  Carbon  fuel  and  illustrates 
the  conditions  obtaining  in  good  practice) 


Percentage  of  C02  in  good  practice,  15. 

Compare  with  Diagrams  I  and  IV. 

When  the  fuel  is  straight  Carbon  the  C02  percentage  plus  the 
Oxygen  percentage  plus  one-half  the  CO  percentage  should 
equal  20.7. 

*  5 

Diagram  Showing  the  Conditions  in  Average  Practice 

Diagram  IV 

(High  Carbon  Coal) 


Air  taken  in  Average  Practise - - - 

Preventable  Waste  •  l7°/o - *“ 

**  —  P50  °/o  frees!  - - - *- 

Seventeen  per  cent  preventable  fuel  loss  chargeable  to  excess  air. 


Appendix. 


171 


Gases  Leaving  the  Furnace 

:w»Krani  V. 

(Theoretical  diagram  based  upon  average  high  volatile 

bituminous  coal) 


Shrinkage 
due  to  for¬ 
mation  of 
vuaterfapor 
from  Com¬ 
bustion  of 


Theoretical  Percentage  of  CO2,  17^9  (Sulphur  Disregarded). 

The  C02  values  for  low-volatile  bituminous  coal  would  be 
higher. 

The  term  “bituminous,”  as  applied  to  coal,  is  a  very  broad  one. 
Coal  low  in  volatile  matter,  viz.:  low  in  hydrocarbons,  which 
means  low  in  hydrogen,  are  termed  “semi-anthracite”  or 
“semi-bituminous.”  In  bituminous  coals  the  Hydrogen  con¬ 
tent  will  average  in  the  neighborhood  of  6  per  cent  of  the 
total  combustible,  neglecting  the  Sulphur,  which  may  run  as 
high  as  10  per  cent  of  the  commercial  coal.  In  the  above 
table  it  is  assumed  that  the  Hydrogen  content  is  6  per  cent 
of  the  Carbon  and  Hydrogen  total. 


When  Hydrogen  burns  the  product  is  water  vapor,  “H20.”  This 
condenses  in  the  burette  of  the  gas  analyzer  and  causes  the 
gas  sample  to  contract  as  shown  in  the  diagram.  Some  of 


172  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


the  Oxygen  having  been  used  to  combust  the  Hydrogen  the 
theoretical  percentage  of  C02  is  necessarily  lower. 

The  theoretical  percentage  will  be  higher  or  lower  in  proportion 
to  the  Hydrogen  content  of  the  coal. 

Gases  Leaving  the  Furnace 

Diagram  VI. 

(Theoretical  diagram  based  upon  average  of  California,  Penn¬ 
sylvania  and  Texas  Crude  Petroleum) 


Shrinkage  due  to 
formation  of  Water 
\apor  from  Combustion 
of  Hydrogen 


Theoretical  Percentage  of  C02,  15  (Sulphur  Disregarded). 

Crude  petroleums  vary  in  their  composition  in  about  the  same 
way  as  the  bituminous  coals.  The  heat  values  range  from 
17,000  to  20,000  B.  t.  u.  Sulphurs  range  from  a  small  fraction 
of  1  per  cent  to  more  than  2.5  per  cent.  The  present  practice 
of  “skinning”  crude  oil  for  gasoline  makes  it  impossible  for 
anyone  to  say  how  the  gases  of  combustion  from  the  deliv¬ 
ered  oil  residues  will  analyze — the  greater  the  percentage  of 
volatile  oils  removed  the  higher  the  percentage  of  C02  from 
the  residues  will  run. 


Appendix . 


173 


Gases  Leaving  the  Furnace 

Diagram  VII 

(Theoretical  diagram  based  upon  averages  of  Ohio,  Pennsyl¬ 
vania  and  West  Virginia  Natural  Gas) 


Theoretical  Percentage  of  CO»,  11.9  (Sulphur  Disregarded). 

Natural  gas  varies  even  more  in  composition  and  heat  value 
than  fuel  oil.  The  theoretical  values  given  above,  will  not, 
however,  be  far  from  the  real  facts  in  any  natural  gas  field. 

Again,  let  me  say  that  whether  you  are  burning  coal, 
wood,  oil,  gas  or  buffalo  chips;  whether  it  is  a  cook  stove, 
a  steam  boiler  furnace  or  an  internal  combustion  engine— 
it  doesn’t  matter.  Use  the  right  amount  of  air  for  combustion 
and  you  will  get  the  highest  efficiency.  The  percentage  of 


174  Hoiv  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


COo  serves  as  a  guide  to  show  the  ratio  of  the  air  taken  for  a 
useful  purpose  and  the  air  excess  that  is  taken  for  wasteful 
results.  Learn  what  percentage  of  COo  there  should  be  in 
the  gases  of  combustion  and  make  sure  that  you  get  it  while 
avoiding  CO.  This  is  the  beginning  and  the  end  of  combus¬ 
tion  efficiency.  The  details  to  be  considered  in  working  out 
your  combustion  problems  will  depend,  as  I  have  shown,  upon 
the  fuel,  the  furnace  or  other  contrivance  in  which  the  fuel 
is  burned  and  the  circumstances  as  to  load,  etc.  Coal  burns 
from  the  bottom  up,  sawdust  burns  from  the  top  down.  High 
volatile  coals  require  an  over-air  supply  as  well  as  air  under 
the  grate.  Gas  and  oil  should  be  mixed  with  air  as  far  as 
possible  prior  to  ignition.  As  you  rise  in  the  scale  of  fuels 
from  lump  anthracite  to  gas  the  air  excess  can  be  decreased. 
Owing  to  the  great  range  and  variety  in  fuels  and  not  know¬ 
ing  what  particular  fuel  you  may  be  using  it  is  hard  to  be 
specific. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  oil  and  gas  have  come  to  stay  as 
fuels  for  power  purposes.  If  the  present  rate  of  increase  is 
sustained  there  will  be  as  many  internal  combustion  engines 
as  steam  engines  in  the  power  plants  of  the  United  States  in 
20  years.  We  are  only  commencing  to  think  about  Gas  Pro¬ 
ducers.  We  have  the  world’s  greatest  supply  of  the  world’s 
finest  gas  producer  fuels — lignite  coal  and  peat — and  have 
barely  touched  them.  Germany  has  shown  us  that  the  by¬ 
products  of  Gas  Producers  have  enormous  value. 

I  have  tried  to  show  that  every  heat  conversion  is  attended 
by  a  waste  of  energy  and  it  follows  that  the  fewer  the  conver¬ 
sions  the  less  the  energy  loss  will  be.  Gas  and  oil  offer 
a  short  cut  from  fuel  to  power  through  the  internal  combus¬ 
tion  engine.  We  can  short-cut  with  coal  through  the  help  of 
the  Gas  Producer.  The  value  of  the  Gas  Producer  by-products 
in  some  German  plants  exceeds  the  cost  of  the  fuel. 

The  Gas  Producer  arrests  combustion  and  converts  non¬ 
combustible  COo  into  combustible  CO.  Hydrogen  and  Me¬ 
thane  (CH4),  are  usually  formed  by  reactive  conversions  along 
with  the  CO.  The  Producer  is  being  operated  most  efficiently 
when  there  is  a  minimum  of  COo  and  no  Oxygen.  Excess  air 
weakens  the  Producer  gas  by  dilution.  Oxygen  indicates 


Appendix. 


175 


excess  air.  CO2  in  Producer  gas  indicates  still  more  excess 
air  and  also  that  some  of  the  Carbon  which  should  have  been 
transformed  into  combustible  CO  is  wasted  by  conversion  to 
non-combustible  COj.  The  non-combustible  Nitrogen  carried 
by  the  gas  will  vary  with  the  Oxygen  and  the  CO2.  Hence  it 
follows  that  when  we  know  the  COj  and  Oxygen  contents  of 
Producer  gas  we  come  near  knowing  the  quality  of  the  gas. 
The  man  in  charge  of  the  Gas  Producer  can  learn  to  work  a 
Gas  Analyzer  for  Oxygen  and  CO2.  Gas  samples  may  be 
taken  at  the  purge  pipe  or  immediately  before  the  gas  is 
delivered  to  the  engine.  The  gas  should  contain  not  to  exceed 
5  per  cent  CO2  and  no  more  than  a  trace  of  Oxygen. 

Local  conditions  determine  whether  it  is  more  economical 
to  burn  oil  or  gas  under  boilers  rather  than  coal.  The  heat 
value  of  crude  petroleum  may  be  anywhere  from  17,000  to 
22,000  B.t.  u.  per  pound.  It  is  a  good  coal  that  will  run  as  high 
as  14,500  B.  t.  u.  It  costs  less  to  handle  oil  than  coal  and 
there  are,  of  course,  no  clinkers  and  ashes.  Oil  has  other 
advantages  that  recommend  it  when  it  can  be  obtained  on 
anything  like  equal  terms  with  coal. 

It  can  be  burned  with  a  higher  combustion  efficiency  be¬ 
cause,  as  already  pointed  out,  it  can  be  properly  burned  with 
a  very  small  excess  of  air.  Very  high  boiler  capacities  can 
be  obtained  more  easily  than  with  coal.  By  increasing  the 
feed  of  oil  the  furnace  temperatures  may  be  raised  to  any 
point  that  the  brick  work  of  the  furnace  will  stand.  Coal 
deteriorates  in  storage  and  oil  does  not,  but  oil  greatly  in¬ 
creases  fire  hazard.  Fuel  oil  has  commenced  to  bid  with 
Eastern  power  plants  as  a  competitor  of  coal  and  when  the 
Mexican  situation  settles  it  may  prove  a  formidable  rival, 
especially  in  the  New  England  field.  Many  manufacturers 
could  now  find  it  worth  while  to  think  about  oil  but  before 
deciding  to  burn  it  they  will  do  well  to  avail  themselves  of 
expert  advice. 

The  rule  that  the  furnace  should  be  designed  with  ref¬ 
erence  to  the  fuel  that  is  to  be  burned  has  double  force  when 
we  are  considering  oil  and  gas.  The  arrangement  must  be 
such  that  the  danger  of  explosions  is  minimized  and  the  possi¬ 
bility  of  damage  due  to  heat  localization  is  limited. 


176  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


The  space  is  lacking  in  which  to  discuss  the  merits  of  the 
various  types  of  oil  burners  on  the  market.  I  must  content 
myself  with  saying  that  the  following  conditions  are  essential 
to  the  efficient  combustion  of  oil: 

1st.  The  oil  must  be  thoroughly  atomized. 

2nd.  The  atomized  oil  must  be  supplied  with  the  re¬ 
quired  quantity  of  air  delivered  in  such  a  way  that 
intimate  mixture  of  the  two  can  take  place. 

3rd.  The  pressure  at  which  the  oil  is  delivered  must  be 
under  absolute  control. 

4th.  The  furnace  must  be  so  designed  that  the  act  of 
combustion  may  be  finished  before  contact  is  had 
with  the  heating  surfaces  of  the  boiler. 

Assuming  that  the  furnace  and  combustion  chamber  are 
of  proper  design  and  that  the  above  conditions  have  been 
met  it  will  be  easier  to  attain  and  maintain  a  high  state  of 
efficiency  than  with  a  coal  burning  furnace. 

First  make  the  settings  absolutely  tight  and  keep  them  so. 

Next  make  sure  by  means  of  analyzing  the  gases  of  com¬ 
bustion  that  the  mixture  is  right.  Some  judgment  may  be 
had  of  the  mixture  by  the  appearance  of  the  flame  but  it  is 
bad  policy  to  depend  upon  the  eye  or  the  judgment  when  more 
dependable  means  are  available. 

Next  make  sure  what  draft  should  be  used  and  then  be 
sure  that  you  use  it.  Draft  is  an  extremely  vital  factor  in 
the  combustion  of  oil — even  more  vital  than  in  the  combus¬ 
tion  of  coal. 

I  take  the  liberty  of  quoting  from  a  letter  relating  to  the 
experience  of  an  engineer  in  a  Texas  oil  burning  plant: 

“It  was  found  that  the  draft  played  a  very  important  part 
in  securing  economical  combustion  and  that  it  was  necessary 
to  pay  very  close  attention  to  the  state  of  the  dampers.  With 
'this  in  view  a  gage  was  made  for  setting  the  dampers,  con¬ 
sisting  of  an  iron  frame  in  the  form  of  a  quadrant  having 
thirty  quarter-inch  holes  drilled  in  the  quarter  circle.  It 
was  presumed  that  this  would  furnish  the  necessary  points 
for  setting  the  damper.  It  was  found,  however,  that  the 
arrangement  did  not  provide  a  sufficiently  close  adjustment 
so  two  additional  holes  were  drilled  for  each  original  hole, 


Appendix. 


177 


making  one  hole  for  each  degree  in  the  quarter  circle.  It 
was  now  believed  that  a  damper  adjustment  could  be  had 
that  would  prove  close  enough  for  the  purpose,  but  such  was 
not  the  case. 

“On  entering  the  fire  room  one  morning  it  was  discovered 
that  the  fireman  had  removed  the  quarter-inch  pin  which 
secured  the  strap  iron  damper  control  to  the  quadrant  and 
substituted  a  ten  penny  nail.  The  fireman  was  asked  if  he 
had  lost  the  pin  and  replied  that  he  could  get  6ne-half  per 
cent  more  CO2  by  using  the  nail  instead  of  the  pin.  The 
quarter-inch  pin  was  then  filed  eccentrically  so  that  the 


— Power  Plant  Engineering:. 

No  matter  what  fuel  you  may  be  using,  watch  the  steam 
wastes. 


178  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 

dampers  could  be  adjusted  to  the  fraction  of  an  inch  and  the 
dampers  in  this  plant  are  now  being  set  in  that  manner. 

“After  several  months  operation  with  this  damper  ar¬ 
rangement  a  new  boiler  was  installed  and  piped  so  that  it 
could  be  connected  to  one  of  the  four  CO2  Recorders.  The 
firemen  were  instructed  to  adjust  the  damper,  oil  feed,  etc., 
to  the  best  of  their  ability  without  the  aid  of  the  Recorder. 
They  did  so  and  the  Recorder  was  then  cut  in.  It  registered 
S  per  Cent  COo.  The  firemen  then,  with  the  aid  of  the  Re¬ 
corder,  immediately  brought  the  CO2  percentage  up  to  14. 
This  proved  that  it  was  impossible  for  even  a  skilled  and 
experienced  fireman  to  accurately  or  even  approximately  judge 
the  state  of  combustion  without  the  aid  of  gas  analyzing 
apparatus.” 

The  following  table  was  prepared  by  the  engineer  of  the 
plant  referred  to  and  is  posted  in  his  boiler  room.  It  shows 
the  firemen  in  dollars  and  cents  the  loss  that  the  company 
will  suffer  if  they  are  not  attentive  to  their  duties. 

The  figures  are  based  upon  a  consumption  of  275  barrels 
of  oil  per  day,  costing  75  cents  per  barrel.  Fifteen  per  cent 
CO 2  was  taken  as  the  standard  which  would  be  about  right 
for  Texas  crude  oil. 


cent  COo. 

Per  cent  Loss. 

Loss  per  Mo. 

Loss  per  Year 

5 

30 

$1,856.17 

$22,274.04 

6 

23 

1,423.07 

17,076.84 

7 

IS 

1,113.70 

13,364.40 

8 

14 

866.22 

10,394.64 

9 

11 

680.60 

8,167.20 

10 

8 

494.98 

5,939.76 

11 

6 

371.23 

4,494.76 

12 

4 

274.49 

3,929.88 

13 

3 

185.61 

2,237.32 

14 

1.5 

92.81 

1,113.72 

15 

0.0 

0.00 

0.00 

179 


Appendix. 


With  them  the  Seed  of 
Wisdom  did  I  sow, 

And  with  my  own  hand 
labored  it  to  grow; 

And  this  was  all  the  Har¬ 
vest  that  I  reap’d — 

“I  came  like  water,  and 
like  Wind  I  go.” 


Omar  Khayyam. 


180 


How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency . 


“MY  TALE  IS  TOLD? 


$ 


Appendix. 


181 


Advertisement 


Hays  School  of  Combustion 

(Incorporated) 

STATE-LAKE  BUILDING 
Chicago,  U.  S.  A. 

H.  C.  ACERS,  President. 

L.  C.  PETTIT,  Vice-Pres.  and  Treasurer. 

If.  R.  NEWLEAN,  Secretary. 


We  offer  a  complete  course  in  Fuel  and  Combustion  En¬ 
gineering,  by  CORRESPONDENCE. 

The  great  need  of  a  comprehensive  course,  teaching  all  that 
is  needful  of  theory  while  expounding  the  best  practise  in  the 
use  of  fuels,  has  long  been  recognized.  Early  in  1919  we 
arranged  with  Mr.  Jos.  W.  Hays  to  write  such  a  course  for  us 
and  to  act  as  Educational  Director  for  the  School.  The  course 
is  now  ready  and  we  are  enrolling  hundreds  of  enthusiastic  stu¬ 
dents.  The  opportunity  that  others  are  grasping  is  yours,  if 
you  want  it. 

At  Mr.  Hays’  suggestion  the  following  staff  of  Reviewing 
and  Advisory  Editors  was  selected: 

MR.  DAVID  MOFFATT  MYERS,  New  York  City. 

Formerly  Advisory  Engineer  National  Fuel  Ad¬ 
ministration. 

MR.  FRED  R.  LOW,  New  York  City. 

Editor  POWER. 

PROF.  S.  W.  PARR,  Urbana,  Illinois. 

Department  of  Chemistry,  University  of  Illinois. 

MR.  ARTHUR  L.  RICE,  Chicago. 

Editor  POWER  PLANT  ENGINEERING. 

MR.  JOSEPH  HARRINGTON,  Chicago. 

Formerly  Administrative  Engineer  for  Illinois,  U. 
S.  Fuel  Administration. 

Every  line  that  Mr.  Hays  has  written  for  this  Course  has 
passed  the  scrutiny  of  these  five  gentlemen,  each  of  whom  is  of 
national  reputation.  The  course  is,  therefore,  absolutely  au¬ 
thoritative  and  embodies  the  best  and  most  advanced  thought 
of  the  day  in  all  that  relates  to  Combustion  and  the  use  of  Fuels. 

PLEASE  NOTE: 

1st.  The  Course  is  not  written  for  men  who  wish  to  be 
Firemen;  it  is  for  those  who  wish  to  be  something  more  than 
Firemen.  Firemen  are  enrolling,  many  of  them,  and  some  of 
them  will  be  showing  other  men  how  to  fire  before  they  have 
completed  the  Course. 


182  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


2nd.  The  Course  was  written  for  men  who  cannot  avail 
themselves  of  the  education  offered  by  technical  schools;  for 
men  who  wish  to  be  put  in  the  way  of  qualifying-  themselves 
for  any  position  or  any  work  involving-  an  expert  and  thorough 
knowledge  of  Fuels  and  Combustion. 

We  have  been  surprised  at  the  large  number  of  graduates  of 
Technical  Schools  who  are  enrolling  as  students  in  the  Hays 
School  of  Combustion.  They  have  had  more  than  they  need  of 
theory  and  now  wish  to  learn  the  application  of  theory  to 
practise. 

In  HOW  TO  BUILD  UP  FURNACE  EFFICENCY,  which  you 
have  just  read,  you  have  become  acquainted  with  Mr.  Hays  in 
just  one  of  his  several  moods.  He  can  be  as  serious  as  anybody 
when  the  occasion  requires.  In  the  twelve  Instruction  Books 
which  he  has  written  for  this  Course  you  will  find  a  laugh  when 
the  humorous  phase  of  a  subject  will  serve  to  impress  you  with 
the  truth  he  is  trying  to  convey,  but  the  tone  of  all  of  the  In¬ 
struction  Books  is  serious  and  scholarly.  If  you  liked  HOW  TO 
BUILD  UP  FURNACE  EFFCIENCY  you  will  be  delighted  with 
each  of  the  twelve  books  of  this  Course. 

Following  is  a  very  brief  outline  of  the.  Course: 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  I. 

Introduction  to  the  Course.  Short  historical  sketch  .of 
boilers  and  engines.  The  Steam  Plant  and  the  Cost  of  Power. 
Some  preliminary  and  practical  observations  upon  Boilers,  Fur¬ 
naces  and  Draft. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  II 

Steam  Boiler  Furnaces  and  their  classification.  The  Plain 
Boiler  Furnace  and  its  modifications.  Tendencies  in  the  develop¬ 
ment  of  Furnaces  and  Boilers.  Rules  of  Practice  for  the  Boiler- 
Room,  etc.  In  this  Instruction  Book  Mr.  Hays  makes  some  very 
practical  suggestions  and  emphasizes  the  importance  of  using 
“common  sense”  in  the  solution  of  power  plant  problems. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  III. 

In  this  book  the  author  discusses  the  physical  laws  govern¬ 
ing  liquids  and  fluids — especially  gases — and  follows  with  a 
clear  explanation  of  Drafts,  both  natural  and  artificial.  Such 
mathematics  as  it  is  necessary  to  introduce  are  brought  within 
the  understanding  of  everybody  who  has  a  knowledge  of  simple 
arithmetic.  Upon  mastering  this  book  the  student  will  be  able 
to  solve  practically  all  mathematical  problems  relating  to  draft. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  IV. 

This  is,  perhaps,  the  most  interesting  book  of  the  entire 
course.  The  subject  is  the  Geology  of  Fuels,  Coal,  Oil  and  Gas. 
Mr.  Hays  leads  up  to  them  with  several  Chapters  on  General 
Geology  and  the  student  after  reading  these  will  really  feel 
that  he  knows  something  about  the  principles  of  Geology.  The 
subjects  of  coal  mining  and  the  dry  and  wet  preparation  of 
coals  are  discussed. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  V. 

Book  V  will  prove  almost  as  interesting  as  Book  IV.  In 
this  book  the  student  learns  something  about  Physics  and 
Chemistry  and  enough  of  Chemical  formulas  to  serve  all  pur¬ 
poses  in  his  study  of  the  Chemistry  of  Combustion,  the  analysis 
of  Coal,  Oil,  Gas,  Water,  etc.  Attention  is  given  to  the  problems 
relating  to  powdered  coal,  fuel  oil  and  gas  burning..  •  , 


Appendix. 


183 


INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  VI. 

This  book  deals  with  the  operation  of  modern  Boiler  Plants 
and  the  student  is  introduced  to  the  numerous  details  of  modern 
plant  equipment.  All  of  the  leading-  types  of  modern  boilers 
and  furnaces  are  shown  and  the  advantages  of  each  are  dis¬ 
cussed.  Heating  and  Ventilation  get  their  due  attention  and 
there  is  a  further  discussion  of  Fuel  Oil  and  Gas. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  VII. 

Smokeless  Combustion  is  considered  in  this  book.  Mr.  Hays 
believes  that  a  few  changes  in  furnace  design,  the  use  of 
mechanical  stokers,  liquid  fuels  and  powdered  coal  will  solve 
the  smoke  problem  in  big  cities.  The  entire  subject  of  smoke 
prevention  is  canvassed  in  a  very  sensible  way,  and,  in  this  book 
as  in  all  of  the  others,  the  student  will  find  many  things  that 
will  be  helpful  if  he  is  connected  with  a  steam  plant.  Applied 
combustion  analysis  is  discussed  again. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  VIII. 

Boiler  and  Furnace  Testing:  These  subjects  are  discussed 
in  all  of  their  details  and  the  student,  after  completing  this 
book,  should  be  able  to  conduct  a  standard  boiler  test  with  any 
fuel,  coal  oil  or  gas.  The  standard  test  codes  are  given,  and 
the  uses  of  combustion  analysis  in  test  work  and  the  working 
out  of  heat  balances  are  explained. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  IX. 

Book  IX  is  devoted  chiefly  to  the  special  combustion  prob¬ 
lems  offered  by  the  locomotive.  It  is  shown  in  many  places  in 
the  earlier  books  that  the  laws  governing  combustion  are  of 
universal  application  and  reference  is  made  in  many  places  to 
the  locomotive.  Book  IX  also  discusses  such  special  problems 
as  relate  to  metallurgical  furnaces,  kilns,  etc.,  and  in  each  case 
the  application  of  gas  analysis  is  discussed. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  X. 

Industrial  Gases  and  the  Gas  Producer  are  covered  in 
Book  X,  together  with  the  problems  especially  related  to  them, 
and  it  is  shown  how  Combustion  Analysis  can  be  employed 
here,  as  elsewhere,  with  the  greatest  profit. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  XI. 

Book  XI  is  devoted  to  Gas  and  Oil  Engines,  special  atten¬ 
tion  being  given  to  the  engine  of  the  future — the  oil  burner  of 
the  Diesel  type. 

INSTRUCTION  BOOK  No.  XII. 

Reference  to  refrigeration  problems  is  made  many  times  in 
the  Course.  This  Instruction  Book  covers  what  remains  to 
be  said. 

APPENDIX. 

The  minimum  <  f  mathematics  will  be  given  in  the  Course 
proper  but  it  is  realized  that  many  students  will  require  help 
in  mathematical  work.  The  student  will  receive  the  appendix 
as  soon  as  his  papers  show  that  he  needs  help.  Students  who 
are  deficient  in  mathematical  training  will  find  the  slide  rule 
of  great  assistance,  especially  in  the  extraction  of  roots.  By 
the  use  of  logarithms  almost  anyone  can  make  calculations  that 
would  be  difficult  or  impossible  by  arithmetic.  Sufficient  Algebra 
will  be  given  to  enable  the  student  to  understand  algebraic 
expressions  and  work  simple  equations. 

The  entire  course  is  profusely  illustrated. 

Write  for  handsome  free  illustrated  booklet,  entitled 

“COMBUSTION  EFFICIENCY.”  Use  the  blank  on  next  page. 


184  How  to  Build  Up  Furnace  Efficiency. 


Mr.  H.  L.  Newlean, 

Sec  y  HAYS  SCHOOL  OF  COMBUSTION, 

State-Lake  Building, 

Chicago,  Ill.,  U.  S.  A. 


Dear  Sir: — I  would  like  full  particulars  relating  tc  the 
Course  in  Fuel  and  Combustion  Engineering,  offered  by  the 
Hays  School  of  Combustion,  also  copy  of  your  booKlet, 
“Combustion  Efficiency,' 


Yours  truly, 


Name. 


Street  Number. 


City  and  State. 


Occupation. 


Date 


19. . . . 


* 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS-URBANA 


3  01 1 2  066442788 


